May 2019

Contents of this sumptuous collection of photographs by Sujoy Das, with incisive text by Lisa Choegyal, include panoramas, the legacy of Sir Edmund Hillary, the lives of Sherpas, Namche Bazar, and much much more.

This marvelous undertaking is dedicated to the Sherpas of the Solukhumbu to mark the centenary of the birth of Sir Edmund Hillary. July 20, 1919 – January 11, 2008

Written by Jayadeva Ranade and published in yesterday’s Sunday Guardian

TAR Party secretary urged cadres to continue the fight against the ‘Dalai clique’ for stability.

NEW DELHI: Over the past many months the Chinese authorities have stepped up efforts to diminish and undermine the XIVth Dalai Lama’s influence over Tibetans inside China. This year is, additionally, marked by a number of anniversaries in China’s political calendar including the 70th year of the founding of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) in October, the founding anniversary of the People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) in April, as well as the sensitive 30th anniversary of the Tiananmen “incident” in June and the 60th anniversary of the XIVth Dalai Lama’s flight from Tibet on 10 March. The latter two would be cause for the most unease to the Chinese leadership. The current strain in Sino-US relations has added to Beijing’s worries.

Despite the investment of billions of dollars in development of the Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR) and further tightening of already stringent security measures in Tibetan populated areas, the Tibetans continue to be restive with occasional incidents of protest and self-immolation. Attention of the Chinese leadership will particularly be focused on the Dalai Lama’s annual message to Tibetans on 10 March, Sunday. This coincides with the 10-day plenary session of the National People’s Congress—loosely called China’s parliament—underway in Beijing since 5 March.

Contributing to Beijing’s increased nervousness is the apprehension in Chinese Communist Party (CCP) leadership echelons that the US plans to resume support to the Tibetans. This is reinforced by indicators that the Dalai Lama continues to be venerated by Tibetans in China.

Wu Sikang, director of the Policy Research Office of the Shenzhen Municipal Government, penned an “internal” report last October after a study visit to the US in August 2018, which was particularly critical of the US. He specifically noted that the US had, after a hiatus of some years, increased financial assistance to Tibetans from this year to US$17 million. In reality, though, the overall quantum of US financial assistance has not increased in the past couple of years, but the amount allocated for Tibet related activities in India and Nepal have this year been doubled from US$3 million to US$6 million. This has aroused Beijing’s suspicions and its concern is reflected in the enhanced attention being paid to Nepal. China has for long apprehended that Nepal would be used by “hostile foreign powers” as a launch pad for anti-China activities by Tibetans inside the Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR).

Reflecting these concerns, the TAR Publicity Department of the Regional Commission for Discipline Inspection on 1 February 2019, released a 46-minute, four-part video, which was aired on Tibet Television from 28 to 31 January. It highlighted that Party officials having religious beliefs or involved in “separatism” or corruption were punished. The report bluntly accused some “two-faced” people in Tibet of claiming loyalty to the Party while secretly sympathising with and even working for “separatists”. It was not clear how many Party members were exposed and punished and for what specific violations, though the video revealed that a total of 215 people had been punished as of October 2018. Xiong Kunxin, an ethnic studies professor at Tibet University in Lhasa was, however, quoted saying the regional government had already identified these people and was strengthening regulations to dismiss them.

Earlier on 29 January, ahead of the Tibetan New Year “Losar”, the Executive Vice-Chairman of the TAR Party Committee, inspected Lhasa’s two most well-known monasteries of Drepung and Gaden. Here he emphasised that “Tibet’s stability is vital to national stability, and maintaining Tibet’s security is akin to safeguarding national security.”

Separately, the TAR authorities announced on 22 January 22, that a new training camp had opened in Shigatse in Tibet under paramilitary supervision to “correct” and “mould” the thinking of Party cadres. It has been tasked to carry out political “education” in the broader Tibetan society. There was also an announcement that a large “Tibet Youth Palace” will be opened in Lhasa in May 2019 to strengthen “patriotic education” among young people.

Meanwhile, a special high-level meeting was convened at the TAR Party School in Lhasa on 21 February to discuss how to prevent major risks to “national sovereignty” and security. Senior TAR leaders attended, including the chairman of the TAR People’s Government, commander of the PLA garrison in Tibet and the head of TAR’s security apparatus. The seminar was addressed by TAR Party secretary Wu Yingjie. He urged cadres to cooperate with the Party in times of “new problems” and “new challenges” and called on them to intensify the “anti-separatist struggle”, proactively take social stability—an euphemism for security measures—initiatives to dilute the “negative influence of religion”, continue the fight against the “Dalai clique” and achieve sustainable long-term stability. He asserted, in this context, the importance of accelerating construction of “well-off” border villages. Wu Yingjie has made a direct critical reference to the “Dalai clique” after a long time!

The Chinese appointed Panchen Lama, Gyaltsen Norbu, continues to be co-opted in the effort. At a symposium on the 30th anniversary of the 10th Panchen Lama organised by the China Tibetology Research Centre on 3 February, Gyaltsen Norbu, highlighted the 10th Panchen Lama’s dedication to China and unwavering confidence in the Communist Party. He claimed that “separatist forces”—namely the Dalai Lama and Tibetans abroad—were distorting and misusing the speeches of the 10th Panchen Lama. He accused them of misleading and deceiving the Tibetan people.

Jay Ranade is a former Additional Secretary in the Cabinet Secretariat, Government of India and is presently President of the Centre for China Analysis and Strategy.

Sixty years ago, a Tibetan guerrilla outfit enlisted the CIA’s help to fight the Chinese. The last surviving fighters of the Chushi Gangdruk look back at battles won and lost. The history of Tibet’s struggle for independence is intertwined with the operations of the guerrilla outfit.

Drawupon is 88 now, but he clearly remembers the face of the Chinese pilot he shot down in 1958. He was running alongside a ravine in Tibet, when a People’s Liberation Army (PLA) fighter plane began firing at him and his fellow fighters. “The plane flew so close to the ground that we could suddenly see it right in front of us. We were filled with rage and just went for it,” he says. The rebels shot at the plane with their American guns — “You could fire 30 bullets at one go” — and were ecstatic when they heard it sputter. As the plane crashed, Drawupon scrambled down the cliff to reach the wreckage. “There were five people inside. Two were dead. We asked the others to surrender but they tried to fire at us. We had to shoot them dead. It was the only Chinese plane shot down in Tibetan history.”

The history of Tibet’s struggle for independence is intertwined with the operations of a guerrilla outfit called Chushi Gangdruk, many of whose members were later absorbed into the Indian Army. From the 1940s to the 1960s, they rose up in arms against the occupying Chinese forces, depending first on the American CIA and then on the Indian government before finally failing to find enough support from either. Their most remarkable feat was ensuring His Holiness the Dalai Lama’s secret escape from the Norbulingka palace in Lhasa to India in 1959. They had got wind of China’s plans to abduct the Dalai Lama on the pretext of inviting him to a play. In June this year, the group celebrated its 60th anniversary.

In the living room of his hilltop house in Kamrao village, Himachal Pradesh, Drawupon clutches at his walking stick for support but that’s about the only sign that time has forced him to slow down. In his book, Buddha’s Warriors (2004), Mikel Dunham, author and Himalayan historian described a teenage Drawupon as “a striking-looking youth. He was already six-feet tall… with broad shoulders and strong limbs.”

The shoulders are still broad and Drawupon remains a commanding presence. His voice wavers slightly but when he speaks, it is with the definitiveness of the tribal chief who led his people in revolt. He doesn’t speak Hindi or English and his grandson, Ngawang Drawu, is the interpreter for our conversation.

Drawupon grew up in Jyekundo, in the Upper Kham region of Tibet. For him, the past is divided into two distinct periods: before and after the Chinese occupation. Before the Chinese trooped in , “the people had their own freedom and livelihoods,” he says. “But they disrupted everything. We used to light butter lamps for our ceremonies. They started to tear them down, saying religion was poison. The tribal chiefs in our provinces loved arms. The Chinese took those away,” he says.

Nevertheless, Drawupon and most Tibetans of his Khampa community loved guns too much to care. “I always carried a Russian-made handgun with me. I remember getting it when I was really young. I also had about 30 bags filled with 1,000 bullets each,” says Drawupon, as he pours himself another cup of tea, his hands rock steady.

He was 26 when Chushi Gangdruk was formed in 1957, by a charismatic merchant-turned-guerrilla Gompo Tashi. “He was a very successful merchant-trader from Kham province, who often took his caravans to Central Tibet and to India for business. That meant he had a better understanding of the world at large than almost anyone within the Lhasan government in Central Tibet,” says Dunham.

In 1950, the infamous Tibetan traitor Ngabo Gwawang Jigme — then the Tibetan governor of Kham — handed over Chamdo province on a platter to the PLA in 1950. “The seeds of resistance grew in Tashi’s mind,” says Dunham. At the time, the Tibetans, already uncomfortable with Chinese presence, were waking up to the extent of their ambitions.

Men, who shared his visceral hatred of the Chinese, rallied around Tashi. Pekar Thinley, born in Ganya Yonghetsang, was one such angry young man.

Now 88, and living in Herbertpur town in Dehradun, Pekar Thinley’s stories of the past are riddled with memories of Chinese occupation. With a flowing white beard and sparkling eyes, Thinley’s days now are spent in prayer. “They had come as early as the 1940s. Slowly and steadily, they started making roads over our agricultural fields. They took away ration meant for our people, and the yaks and horses which we needed for our trade and transport. They destroyed our stupas,” he says. “They had always come with the intention of war.”

The first time he fought the Chinese was in 1955. The Chinese had taken over the Keri-Tsa-Kha lake and 40 soldiers were guarding it. Before their arrival, says Thinley, “no one owned it. Common Tibetans could come and take its salt. But the Chinese troops started charging 15 yen for a small bag of salt. We ambushed and overpowered them one day, and gave them 100 whiplashes each.”

Gompo Tashi wasn’t any ordinary rebel commander. He had the foresight of a military strategist as well. In the years leading up to 1957, he travelled far and wide in his quest for allies, which included the American government and, subsequently, its CIA unit. He had on his side trusted compatriots, including the Dalai Lama’s two brothers Gyalo Thondup and Taktser Rinpoche.

Thondup was amongst the first to touch base with CIA officials in Calcutta as early as 1951-1952. In 1957, Tashi and Thondup’s efforts at covert international outreach bore fruit. The CIA came on board and agreed to train a batch of six Tibetans in guerrilla techniques, including warfare and intelligence gathering and exfiltrate them. They were trained by the Americans on Saipan Island in the western Pacific Ocean before their eventual reinfiltration into Tibet.

The subcontinent in the late 1950s was a playground for multiple geopolitical forces. Sandeep Bhardwaj, research associate with the Centre for Policy Research in Delhi, says, “The US had been opposed to the Communist rise in China since 1949. Throughout the 1950s and 1960s, it had a hostile relationship with Beijing, which it saw as the most important Soviet ally in the Cold War… In 1958, the American 303 Committee (responsible for oversight of covert operations) gave approval for CIA support to the Tibetan resistance. The fighters were trained in airborne operations and missions were carried out in Tibet.”

No mission was greater than the one to ensure the Dalai Lama’s total safety. And it was becoming increasingly clear to the leaders that the Dalai Lama was not safe in Tibet. On the evening of March 17, 1959, when the Chinese started shelling Norbulingka Palace, the Dalai Lama’s closest advisor, Phala, coordinated with other rebel leaders and helped the Dalai Lama and his closest family members move out of the palace under the cover of night, armed and in disguise.

In an interview with Dunham, Roger McCarthy, the CIA officer in charge of training the Tibetans and one of the leading officials of the Tibet operation, says that orders “went quickly from the agency … to the White House and finally to Prime Minister (Jawaharlal) Nehru. The permission to enter India got back to the Dalai Lama before our Ambassador in India had even been advised.”

For some time, the Chushi Gangdruk tried to operate out of Mustang in Nepal, because India wouldn’t allow rebel activities on its soil. Lhamo Tsering, a resistance leader, acted as the chief liaison officer between the CIA and the rebel forces then. Tsering’s son Tenzing Sonam — artist, filmmaker and the founder of the Dharamsala International Film Festival — says, “My father’s involvement with the Chushi Gangdruk began in 1958. He had been Thondup’s chief secretary and companion since their college days in Nanking in the 1940s. They had escaped together to India. In 1958, the CIA had agreed to expand the training programme and move the location to the US itself. My father was told to accompany the second group of trainees to the US. After this, he gradually assumed operational responsibilities in planning actions inside Tibet and liaising between the CIA and the Chushi Gangdruk.”

After the Dalai Lama crossed over, there began a steady influx of Tibetan refugees into India via Assam — many of them Chushi Gangdruk rebels and their families. Drawupon made that journey too, crossing over in May 1959 into Missamari in Assam. By the time he reached here, along with 40,000 others, he had seen friends and family dying on the way. “The Indian government had built huts for us. But it was summer and our people were not used to that heat. Every day, five or 10 people would die,” says Drawupon.

Everything, from the climate to the food, was unfamiliar. “They gave us dal and vegetables. We thought the dal was for the horses! We weren’t used to it. We survived on bread and milk,” he says.

Once in India, says son Drawu, Drawupon’s commander, Gompo Tashi, prevailed on him to take up a leadership role in the nascent Tibetan government-in-exile.

The Chinese aggression of 1962, meanwhile, led Nehru to consider the potential of a ready cache of Tibetan soldiers. India’s Special Frontier Force was born, which would also include Tibetan Chushi Gangdruk rebels as part of its sub-unit, called Establishment-22. They, too, would be trained by the CIA, officially, at the Indian army’s Agra air base.

Pekar Thinley was amongst the early recruits to Establishment 22. “As far back as in 1956, I had helped ambush and blow up 12 trucks of the Chinese,” he says. But his best moments as a soldier, he says, when he learnt to paradrop. “We were told to count to three before jumping. But once the aircraft door opened, and I tried counting, my mouth was filled with air. I tried again, but then I jumped anyway.” Others faced a different problem. “Some of us who didn’t follow English or Hindi properly, kept counting loudly even after we landed on the ground. We were told to shut up because even the Chinese could hear us!” he says. Pekar Thinley and hundred other Tibetan soldiers, would also be deployed in the 1971 East Pakistan war eventually.

By the late 1960s, however, the international Tibetan guerrilla intrigue started to unspool. In 1969, helmed by Henry Kissinger, the US and China decided on a rapprochement policy. This meant that all support to Chushi Gangdruk in Mustang, and American assistance to India’s Est. 22 would also stop. In 1974, Tsering was arrested by the Nepali police and imprisoned for seven years. The Dalai Lama, to avert any war involving his host country, asked the rebels in Mustang to surrender.

What rankles both Pekar Thinley and Drawupon is the lack of recognition — in the form of a pension — from the Indian government for their services in the 1971 war.

And was the fight worth it? In a 1998 documentary for the BBC on the Tibetan resistance, The Shadow Circus: The CIA in Tibet, Tsering talks about the significance of the Tibetan rebellion: “I don’t see our armed struggle as something that is finished… I believe we should look at it as one chapter in our continuing struggle for freedom. One that still has some meaning.”

In 1978, Chitwan National Park established a captive breeding center for the gharials, one of the most off-putting reptiles on earth. Even by crocodilian standards, the gharial looks like bad news. Their size alone is unnerving. Males commonly attain a length of 10-17 feet and weigh up to 550 pounds. Females are somewhat smaller. Both sexes look equally intimidating.

Adding to the effect is a feature that distinguishes them from their cousins: a narrow and freakishly elongated snout. Its jaws open and shut with the rigidity of a movie clapboard. 110 very sharp interdigitated teeth peek out between lipless lips, creating the grimmest smile you’ll ever hope to encounter.

Other than that, the gharial’s expression gives nothing away. Especially the eyes. The jaundiced-green irises are split down the center by black razor-thin slits. The slits allow the creature to scan the shoreline for its next prey without moving its head.

If my description sounds intentionally harsh, it is. I want to underline the irony behind human-gharial relations. Affinity, based on looks, may be the main reason people are indifferent to the gharial’s survival. Man can simultaneously love and fear tigers (sumptuously striped fur, sexy stealth) or rhinos (power incarnate clad in mediaeval armor) because, well, because those predators are just plain cool. Seen any “Save the Gharial” bumper stickers on America cars lately?

Gharials are, in fact, shy. Except in very rare cases, they do not harm humans. Yes, gharials repulse us, but – unlike tigers and rhinos – they don’t kill us. Quite the opposite. It is human encroachment that has all but rendered gharials extinct.

A century ago, the gharial inhabited all the major river systems of the Indian Subcontinent. Today, its distribution has shriveled to 2% of its former range. As per the census in 2016, Nepal’s wild population is 198 (166 in Chitwan and 32 in Bardiya.) The uphill battle to save the gharial is foiled by continuing loss and fragmentation of riverine habitat, (where they bask and bury their eggs), depletion of fish resources, and entanglement in fishing nets. It is now listed as critically endangered.

Nevertheless, in spite of overwhelming odds against success, conservationists and the Nepal Army are doing their best to stabilize the gharial population, if not increase it.

The Gharial Conservation and Breeding Center – a popular tourist attraction in Chitwan – contains over a dozen concrete pools to nurture young gharials. The process begins with harvesting eggs. Every year their eggs are collected along the rivers to be hatched back at the center. The babies are reared at the Center until they reach adolescence, between six and nine years old.

Lt. Col. Lokesh and I walked down the central sidewalk that separates the pools, each basin populated by gharials segregated by age. Lokesh explained that periodically – once the reptiles reached a length of about five feet – they are removed from the hatchery and released into the Narayani-Rapti river system.

Only a few days before, the Breeding Center had released 24 gharials into the Rapti River not far from where I had mistaken a gharial for a log. Lokesh pointed toward a stack of sturdy wooden crates. “Those were what we used to transport the animals to the river.”

Members of local communities were waiting at the designated site for what was basically a handover ceremony. Breeding Center officials unloaded the crates, but it was the locals who conducted the release of the gharials into the Rapti. It may seem like an insignificant gesture, but conservationists feel strongly that the people who depend solely on the river for survival should be the ones to reintroduce the endangered species back into the river system. It instills a feeling of empathy among the locals – of ownership. Indeed, the natives have come to believe that they share the responsibility of protecting gharials which, after all, are river natives just like they are.

But what happens to the reptiles after their release? A gharial’s waterway habitat can extend as much as 125 miles. Chitwan’s rivers flow downstream about 62 miles before crossing into India. The problem is that gharials can no longer swim back to Nepal, if and when they reach India. Currents coming the other way are too strong and human-made barrages block the way. As a result, about 75% of the gharials released in Nepali become permanent Indian residents, beyond the purview of Nepali protection. And even if they remain in Nepal, depletion of fish resources and fishnet entanglements further reduce their odds for survival.

On my final morning in Chitwan, I went on a two-raft armed patrol on the Rapti River. Lt. Colonel Lokesh led the team. My hope was to see adult gharials up close. I was in the heart of one their last safe havens.

We descended an embankment and the squad fell into line to received instructions. A troop of gray langurs, perched in nearby trees, squawked and chattered and, in general, talked over the patrol’s directive.

We shoved off and glided into the Rapti. Unlike the Karnali River, the Rapti is modest in width. The southern embankment was colonized by aquatic plants and grasses, and, rising behind, dense forest. In stark contrast, the northern bank was a vast expanse of sand-and-pebble beach. A single row of chitals, one of the smallest deer reaching only three-feet high – were traversing the beach diagonally, toward the river’s edge. A peacock, in response to their approach, took wing for a few feet before settling back down behind some scrub brush.

The rowers fell into rhythmic pull and so did my thoughts.

A team of ducks paddled to one side of our raft, in deference of our advance. Waders along the shore included storks, kingfishers and hornbills. The Army’s Nature Conservation School couldn’t be more perfectly situated, I thought. Forget the slide shows: Everything outside the lecture hall is this Imax version, a 3D laboratory of naturereplete with disrespectful monkeys.

Lokesh tapped me on the shoulder. Twenty feet away from us on the edge of sandbank was an adult male gharial. I knew he was male because of the unsavory protuberance at the end of his snout – a twisted mound that looked like a tumor. Nothing decorative about it. Even the gharial’s name implies that. “Gharial” comes from the Hindi word ghara, a lowly earthenware pot. And what is it purpose? Biologists have failed to agree on the function of the unseemly growth.

It may seem absurd but -- as I began photographing the creatures -- the mystery of the knot instilled in me a newfound respect for the creature. Suddenly, the animal was anything but repulsive.

Maybe it had to do with my experience the day before – having witnessed the gharials’ slow developmental stages at the Breeding Center – understanding the years it took them to reach maturity, the struggle to exist in a world over which they had no control.

We oared past perhaps a dozen grown gharials that morning, all in similar poses: parallel to the river’s edge, motionless and forever uninviting.

What was their sense of self-preservation? Surely, it had to be at least on par with a human’s. And yet it was only us, the human race, that could protect them. That’s what had befallen them in the 21st century.

Did they somehow intuit the end of their species?

One thing for sure: The military wasn’t giving up on them.

It made me proud to be a vicarious partner and witness to the determination and professionalism of the Nepal Army.

Conservation is an auxiliary Nepal Army duty. Its two primary duties are to defend the country from outside threats and to assist the government in maintaining internal security. And yet it’s difficult to keep the pecking order in mind, once you’ve been embedded with armed patrols in the Bardiya and Chitwan jungles. That’s because the army is preforming at such high levels in the national parks.

For one thing, its pursuance in preserving Nepal’s wildlife and forest resources is frontloaded with innovation and genuine enthusiasm. What might have been a “duty calls” boilerplate conservation plan has evolved into a program that has been recognized as the advance guard of conservation.

The World Wildlife Fund (WWF) certainly thinks so: Nepal Army units and personnel have been the recipients of a long list of WWF’s Abhram Conservation Awards. As of this writing, Conservation Assured – Tiger Standards (CA-TS), an international review process that assesses excellence in tiger site management, has given its seal of approval to only two reserves worldwide. One of them is Chitwan National Park.

Like Major Karki and other officers I met in both Bardiya and Chitwan, Lieutenant Colonel Lokesh K.C. exemplifies the army’s determination to perpetuate a stellar reputation.

Lokesh is the Officiating Commandant of the Nature Conservation School, one of the army’s more recent innovations. Located in Kasara, it’s within walking distance from Army Headquarters. The school – the first of its kind – was created three years ago, in 2015.

The school’s initial objective was to prepare soldiers for their unique duties in Chitwan prior to being deployed. The institution has grown and now provides nine different types of training for NA soldiers, including: how to minimize personal life-threatening risks once they go out on patrols, how to support wildlife research works, how to conduct wildlife census, and how to control encroachment, illegal poaching and deforestation, among other conservation-specific issues.

Beyond that, the school has developed into a joint conservation institution, which means – in addition to army personnel – park officials, conservation partners and other civilian stake-holders work hand-in-hand. The Social Service syllabus includes increasing conservation awareness within local communities, afforestation, repairing and renovating schools and shrines, assisting health centers in the park and the buffer zones, assisting medical care and water supply, and construction of bridges and service roads.

The school’s third course of study covers disaster management. Training programs target the specific challenges that occur in Nepal’s floodplains throughout the rainy season. Lt. Col. Lokesh and I discussed the destruction incurred by the most recent monsoon.

By August 2017, at the peak of the monsoon, incessant flooding had inundated huge swathes of the southern plains, damaging roads, cutting off access to communities, creating widespread power outages, devastating crops, killing at least 130 people and displacing tens of thousands. Army rescue teams were at the vanguard of response efforts for people affected by the catastrophe.

But the flooding took its toll on the wildlife population as well. The torrents were powerful enough to sweep 4000-pound rhinos downstream and across the southern border. Once the flood waters receded, Chitwan soldiers were able to retrieve seven rhinos discovered in the Bihar state of India. Aided by 100 Indian wildlife officials, Nepal Army loaded the tranquilized beasts into crates and trucked them back to their home in Chitwan National Park, 150 kilometers to the north.

Lt. Col. Lokesh is well suited for his job. To some extent he acts as an emissary to the civilian population. He’s smart and amiable, a combination that obviously lends itself to interacting with environmentalists and locals alike. He is also driven by a steely sense of purpose, committed to the school’s expansion strategies, one of which is to invite foreign student officers for specialized trainings. He took me on a tour of the facilities, centered around a domed hall, spacious enough to accommodate large groups of trainees.

The building is situated on a slight promontory within a few steps of the Rapti River. We walked over to the ledge of the vertical embankment and paused for a moment to view the river – significantly smaller during the dry months. 20 feet below us, a rhino lolled in the shallows next to the bank. Its one-horned head pivoted toward us. The rest of its body was entirely submerged. With semi-prehensile lips, it grasped an aquatic plant stem, bit off the top and began to chew.

The opposite riverbank was a sprawling sand-and-pebble shoal. (According to Lokesh, the sandbar would be entirely underwater come monsoon season, transforming our vista into an expansive lake.) He pointed at something fifteen-feet-long near the edge of the receding riverbank. “See that?” he asked.

I did see something, but It was identical to the color of the sandbank and I’m nearsighted. At that distance the object in question was out of focus. I hazarded a guess. Whatever it was, it was motionless, certainly not a living thing. Without too much conviction, I proposed that it was a tree trunk that had been washed ashore.

Lokesh laughed. “Gharial. Out in the open is the best place to hide. Come on, I’ll show you some gharials up close.”

And with that, we proceeded to the Gharial Conservation and Breeding Center, not far from the Nature Conservation School.

It was just after lunch. The barefooted mahout (elephant driver) jiggled his toes behind the elephant’s ear flaps and the elephant backed up. From where I stood, gazing down from a 13-foot scaffolding, the pachyderm resembled a broad gray boat carefully docking astern.

Looking upward, a corporal gave me the signal to be the first to “mount”, which is probably not the right word. Rather than hoisting up, I stretched one leg out over the edge of the scaffolding and took the long step below – onto the hathihowdah. The hathi howdah (elephant saddle) is a wooden platform. It rests atop multiple blankets and a lampat, (a jute mat packed with straw and covered with a cotton cushion), which protects the animal’s spine. Once aboard, I squatted until I was directed to sidle forward just behind the mahout.

The construction of the square-shaped hathi howdah included a foot-high guardrail connected at the four corners by knobby newel posts. I extended my legs under the guardrail on either side of my designated newel post, then dropped my feet over the top of the elephant’s front left side.

Peering over the mahout’s shoulder, I had a confidential view of his far more comfortable saddle, which was the massive neck of the elephant. The mahout’s legs straddled the thick loose skin. In one hand he held a stick for prodding if a trail situation became serious. His other hand affectionately patted the dome of the animal’s head. I was observing a long-term intimacy between the mahout and his 10,000 companion. At such close quarters, I felt like an eavesdropping alien, which of course I was – and an envious one at that.

Major Purshotum Karki, Officiating Commander of Chitwan's Batuk Battalion, plopped down next to me on the right, followed by two other men, who occupied the back two corners of the howdah. There were three elephants in our armed patrol that day, four soldiers atop each elephant.

Trained elephants can understand at least 30 verbal commands. While we waited for the other elephants to load, Major Karki handed the mahout a brass Nepali coin. The mahout casually flipped it into a nearby clump of underbrush, gave a command to the elephant, who extended its trunk, delicately extracted the coin from the brush, back-curled its trunk and returned it to the mahout’s outstretched hand. Elephant cognition – communication, memory and all the rest – is a thing to behold.

An elephant’s mode of locomotion is equally experiential. Its four-legged stride creates four-directional plunges that can clearly be distinguished by a passenger: front right dip, back left dip, front left dip, back right dip. Rock-and-roll on the rugged side. A vessel on open sea. Believe me, you learn very quickly to stiffen your back and use the newel post as a saddle horn. Mind you, that’s on level ground.

But why, in the modern era of tough-terrain vehicles, does the army still require elephants? (I am aware of the controversy surrounding the abusive treatment of domestic elephants. I witnessed none with the army’s small herd. The animals are very well cared for. And unlike the complaints leveled against the tourist industry, army elephants are not overused. In Chitwan, elephant patrols are limited to two excursions per week.) The advantage of the army having elephants for security operations is two-fold. Obviously, sitting ten feet above the jungle floor greatly improves the soldier’s range of vision and degree of safety. With rare exception, the sheer size of an elephant wards off predacious wildlife. But there is an equally important advantage. Elephants are anatomically constructed to negotiate, sustain and overpower terrain utterly inaccessible to vehicles.

Once we left the main dirt road, which was slightly elevated, we headed down a narrow jungle tract that had been cleared by the army at natural ground level. This was in mid-March, the dry season, and you could see from the tire tracks that jeeps found the road passable. But Major Karki gestured to the dense woodland on both sides of the trail and said that it was treacherous in there. It would worsen with the arrival of the three-month summer monsoon. Much of this area would become either unpredictably sodden – as mushy as a wet sponge – or completely underwater. Ergo, elephants.

If I wasn’t convinced that using elephants was essential, I soon would be.

As if on cue, the elephant ahead of us turned to the left, bullied through some saplings and slowly made a path for itself in the virgin forest. Our elephant followed suit, although it chose a different means of access. Snapping undergrowth became our soundtrack. Tree limbs a dozen feet above the ground mutated into limber whips ready and able to smack us in the face, if we weren’t quick enough to ward them off with our hands.

Adding to the jarring shift was the utter unevenness of the jungle floor. With every leisurely elephant step, the ground seemed to shift or sink. Entangled tree-root systems heaved aboveground. Colossal simal trees, which develop expansive cathedral-like buttresses at their bases, impeded the way. Dense thickets were penetrated by shear force. Gullies and unstable embankments had to be negotiated. Monstrous vines like the strangler fig, twined and looped upward, using larger trees for support until the trees collapsed under the creeping weight. A fallen tree of considerable girth was up ahead. The elephant simple stepped over it.

OK, I got it. The riverine jungle was Impossible for vehicles and dangerous for man on foot. Still, how did the elephant negotiate all the treacherous deviations?

For one thing, an elephant’s foot is designed in such a way that it actually walks on the tips of its toes. In spite of its weight, there’s a great deal of delicacy underfoot. Furthermore – and this has been discovered only recently – their legs work like a four-wheel drive vehicle, making them possibly unique in the animal kingdom. Their "four-leg-drive" system means power is applied independently to each limb, both for acceleration and braking. Elephants set the gold standard for sure-footedness.

The deeper into the forest we went, the more overwhelming the abundance of flora and fauna became. I saw numerous tree species native to the subcontinent: the saj with its distinctive bark that resembles crocodile skin; the lofty Kusum, with its new foliage sprouting in fiery red; the Haldu, which, like the simal has a gothic-otherworldly trunk; and the karam, regarded as the tree of fertility in the Hindu tradition. Now and then, we passed termite mounds with spires ten-feet high. Interlacing the trees were birds of all descriptions, including emerald parakeets, goldenbacked woodpeckers and blackheaded orioles. The most impressive fowl, pecking about the jungle floor, was a wild peacock, scratching around in leaf litter for anything that moved – from ants to poisonous snakes.

I asked the major what would happen if we encountered wild elephants. (The day before, while on jeep patrol, we had gotten word that a wild herd was just up the road and some of the males were becoming restless, if not frenzied. We pulled over until we received word that the herd had moved on.) Major Karki shrugged.

Studies have shown that domestic elephants that escape or are set free have no problem returning to the wild. Encountering wild elephants isn’t usually a problem unless there’s bull in musth. Musth is a periodic condition in which testosterone levels of males can be as much as 60 times greater than in the same elephant at other times. (I flashed on the deadly mood swings of Renaldo, the deranged and, perhaps disconsolate denizen of Chitwan.)

Eventually, the three elephants headed back toward camp, edging toward the narrow tract from which we started. Afternoon sun filtered through the foliage at an angle.

Unexpectedly, my elephant suddenly came to a halt. It uprooted a lengthy broad-leaved plant and stuffed it into its mouth. I peered over the shoulder of the mahout and checked his bare feet: They remained motionless under the earflaps, apparently content with his companion’s impromptu snack.

A few feet beyond and above my head, something flashed. I looked up. It was a sprawling cobweb quivering from tree-filtered sunlight. Toward the top of the web was a golden orb web spider with a very impressive wingspan. The elephant plucked another plant from the earth. I reached for my iphone, intending to take a photo of the spider. But then I noticed something else behind the spider’s home: CCTV surveillance was attached to a sal trunk 15 feet above the jungle floor. I was the observer being technologically observed. Should I wave to the guys monitoring things back at JCOC? Too late: My ride suddenly flapped his ears and plunged forward, taking me beyond the digital eyes of the forest.

The dry season – December through June – is when poaching is most likely to take place. Water levels are at their lowest and the difficult tracts through the dense riverine forests are easiest to penetrate for poachers. Thus, the dry season corresponds with the annual activation of Nepal Army’s “Operation Mahahunt”, initiated in Chitwan in 2011. The goal was to add muscle to regular army patrols and to concentrate on the most sensitive areas in and around the park. Gradually, the operation has come to include the cooperation of the national park authorities and the local communities. This year, Operation Mahahunt is being conducted with the assistance of special ops forces (SOF), brought in from Mid-Division Headquarters.

It should also be understood that daily patrols are not enough to achieve Zero Poaching. The most likely crossing places of poachers are located between outposts and under the cover of darkness. The army implements 42-plus nightly patrols, referred to as ambushes. They range from 4-man teams to platoon-size forces, paying particular attention to known hotspots for illegal activity.

One evening, Major Karki took me along on an Operation Mahahunt night ambush. It combined Batuk Dal Battalion troops and Special Ops. The SOF contingent, a platoon of foot soldiers, was 29-men strong.

The SOF moved out first. It was around sunset. I was embedded with Major Karki’s jeep patrol We deployed about two hours after SOF. Our jeeps traversed the Rapti Bridge, just north of Kasara, then headed due west across the Buffer Zone, through the open floodplains (now dry and cultivated for crops) under a moonless sky.

Around 8:40 pm, just as we were approaching the outskirts of a darkened village, we caught up with the SOF platoon. They were in single file and moving at an impressive pace. Major Karki ordered our jeeps to halt, jumped out and informed me that we would join the SOF on foot.

I was introduced to Major Bogati, the SOF platoon leader. He was of impressive build and height. His head was shaven and his young face was dripping with sweat. He shouldered a heavy backpack. He and his men would be camping out later that night at an especially sensitive location. If he was fatigued after 2 ½ hours of brisk marching, his voice didn’t reveal it.

As an American, I couldn’t help thinking that Major Bogati would be a perfect candidate for a U.S. Ranger regiment or a spot in the U.S. Army War College. You often see this type of man in the Nepal Army. In fact, many Nepali officers have attended Ranger School and the War College in the U.S. as part of their ongoing training.

We moved forward on foot, into the sleeping community before us. The rudimentary road went straight through the center of town. There were no sidewalks to separate the houses and storefronts from the narrow throughway.

The road was rock-strewn, highlighted by crisscrossing beams of army flashlights – switched on, no doubt, for my benefit. Apart from an occasional kerosene lamp glowing through a curtained window, the town was a blackout: no vehicles coming from the other direction, no farmers returning home for the night – only an unseen chorus of dogs protesting our territorial intrusion.

Major Bogati gestured toward the two-story houses and explained that gathering local intelligence was one of the great advantages of patrolling at night. This was when many villagers, under the cover of darkness, mustered the courage to slip out of their homes, catch up with moving units and relay rumors of poaching activities about to take place.

Community-based disclosures, he continued, were one of the army’s most valued sources of intelligence – essential for successful army ambushes, arrests and, ultimately, prosecutions.

Progress through town proceeded without incident. No informants emerged from their dwellings to pass along information. At the far end of the village, we returned to the jeeps, leaving Major Bogati and his men to continue on foot without us.

30 or 40 minutes later, we approached the convergence of the Narayani and Rapti rivers, then headed northeast, parallel to the embankment of the Narayani, although we couldn’t actually see the water in the darkness. (I also knew that we were nearing popular leopard territory but searching for them wasn’t on that night’s agenda.)

We gained altitude and, eventually, we stopped at a dirt cul-de-sac near an outpost called Bimle. Several jeeps of men had been awaiting our arrival. These were from local and SOF units. We exited the jeeps and proceeded on foot up a path and climbed over a six-foot stone style.

Beyond, rose the silhouette of a 40-50-foot observation tower at the apex of a hill. It was constructed from heavy timber. No one spoke except in whispers. When we reached the base of the tower, I followed Major Karki up three flights of ladders, which led to the top.

Looking down from the balcony, I could see that we were now even with the canopy of trees, but I could nevertheless discern the dim pattern of intersecting footpaths described beneath the foliage.

It was explained to me that, a few years before, six rhinos had been slaughtered nearby. The massacre tipped off the army that Bimle was an overlooked entry point for poachers and the lookout tower was erected soon after.

Major Karki briefly conferred with one of the two SOF sentries stationed on the balcony. So far, no unusual activity had been detected that evening. Soon after, Karki and I descended, leaving the skeleton detail to keep watch through the night. “Next time,” someone muttered behind me.

As I returned to Chitwan Headquarters with the major, bumping along in the jeep, I thought of all the surreptitious troop movement being conducted that night – as stealthy as the leopards, who were also hunting under cover of darkness, and would remain elusive during my investigation. “Next time,” the guy had said, which was just another way of saying “patience.”

Professionalism, Pervasiveness and Patience seemed to be the motto of the jungle patrols.

The Zero-Poaching concept was initiated by the army in 2011. Numerous tactics are involved. Technology has already been mentioned (see PART TWO): Using the most up-to-date computers, telecommunications, etc., gives enforcement a decisive edge over poachers.

Another aspect is deploying the troops to optimize effective command. The Batuk Dal Battalion has been divided into five sectors with 47 permanently established outposts covering the breadth and length of the Chitwan reserve.

Capacity: Increasing the battalion’s ability and motivation to protect wildlife is also crucial if Zero-Poaching is to continue.

Major Karki took me on an armed jeep patrol to visit many of these 47 posts. The tour included Chitwan Park’s Tourist Center, a major checkpoint. At the bus stop, two K9 teams were at work. The German Shepard was sniffing the passengers, who had just been dislodged from their bus. The Labrador Retriever was inside the vehicle, bounding over and snuffling under the seats, where any baggage and parcels remained.

We also ventured into buffer zone areas. Along the way, we saw armed foot, bicycle, and motorcycle patrols in active reconnaissance. Clearly, the sheer pervasiveness of the army – the multiplicity of its activities in and of itself – has to be a potent deterrent for would-be poachers.

When the army does capture a poacher, he is turned over to the civilian authorities in charge of prosecution. A well-functioning judicial-criminal process is imperative to achieve Zero-Poaching. Apprehending poachers is one thing; punishing them to the full extent of the law is another. Governmental corruption within the judicial-criminal process is nothing new in Nepal and it creates an atmosphere of unpredictability. And although the judicial system is beyond the army’s jurisdiction, close monitoring of who is prosecuted and who is not prosecuted is definitely on the army’s radar.

There is another consequence of unpredictability, when striving to protect wildlife.

Half-way through the jeep tour, we pulled up to the gated entrance of Dharampur, a wooded fenced-in outpost sheltering several barracks. Major Karki told me this was the spot where, only four months before (on November 10, 2017), Captain Rajkumar Shrestha was savagely attacked by a rogue elephant and died a few weeks later. I asked Karki how frequently lethal soldier-wildlife conflict occurred in Chitwan. Since 1975, when the army was first assigned to protect Chitwan, 111 soldiers have died in the line of duty.

But it’s not just army personnel that are at risk. Karki was quick to point out that lethal attacks are more frequent within the border communities. In the last year, villagers have suffered three deaths and eleven injuries. One death was caused by tiger attack and two by elephants. (There is one tusker currently on the loose, who’s unpredictable behavior has earned him the nickname Renaldo – referring to footballer Cristiano Renaldo, presumably because of the superstar’s versatility and trickery in attacking opponents.) Also, in the last year, four local people have been attacked by rhinos and six by sloth bears. Human-wildlife conflict (and livestock casualties) constantly cloud the water.

It follows that recognizing how to best include local communities in protection efforts is an essential tactic for achieving Zero-Poaching.

What happens, for instance, when a local villager is killed by a man-eating tiger? Once the animal has been located, it is either eliminated or removed from the park. When possible, the army tranquilizes the beast and has it transported it to Kathmandu’s zoo. Sometimes, the latter is not an option and the animal must be put down. Either way, the remedy may temporarily placate a local’s apprehension… but does it allay his or her fear of future attacks?

Tigers, elephants and rhinos are life-threatening. Period. Take the rhino, for example: The farmers know all too well what happens when a rhino attacks. Unlike the African Rhino, which uses its horn to toss and gore its adversaries, the Asian One-Horned Rhino relies on its bottom canine teeth to rip and slash into human flesh. And it will attack, if threatened or antagonized.

Rhinos also compromise villagers’ economic well-being. They can devastate locals’ crops and properties and kill livestock in a short time span. The average male rhino is 12-feet long, stands 7-feet high and tips the scale at two tons. Villagers don’t mistake its enormity for sluggishness. Rhinos at a full run have been clocked at 34 mph. Horses gallop at an average of 25-30 mph by comparison. A farmer’s wheat field or – even more frightening – his house built of bamboo-lattice and mud-plaster walls is no defense against such a massive browser. (Linguaphiles take note: There’s a legitimate reason the collective noun for a group of rhinos is a CRASH of rhinos.)

As I had learned in Bardiya, one method the army uses to appease the villagers’ animosity toward wild animals is to conduct community-awareness programs. Among other things, these underline the economic benefits for supporting wildlife preservation. The tourist industry: People come from all over the world to see Nepal’s rhinos and tigers and other endangered species. Tourism accounts for 7.5 percent of Nepal’s GDP and is forecast to rise 4.3 percent annually. More to the point: These tourist dollars have been proven to boost the income of the communities close to the parks.

Still, awareness is a two-way street. In conducting awareness programs, it’s imperative that the army remain sensitive to the local communities very real fears. The army realizes that human-wildlife conflict is and will remain an ever-present chessboard of complications.

Community cooperation with the army vs. sleepless nights while rhinos snort or tigers snarl or tuskers rumble out in the darkness. Dams vs. free-flowing rivers. Cable-stayed bridges vs. dugout canoes. The army’s challenge is to keep up with the fluidity of human-wildlife conflict and the changes brought on by 21st-century dynamics without ignoring the natives’ traditional ways of living. Thus, the final aspect of Zero-Poaching is: constantly assess how effective the army’s tactics have been and modify those tactics accordingly.

Chitwan National Park – a full-day’s drive east from Bardiya National Park – is located in south-central Nepal along the Indian border. It is a World Heritage Site and is Nepal’s third most popular tourist destination, even though visitors are required to adhere to strict regulations. Among other closely monitored rules, tourists are strictly prohibited to walk within the park between sunset and sunrise.

My first morning in Chitwan began in Kasara, the centrally-located headquarters for army security forces. A briefing was held in a building called the Joint Conservation Operation Cell (JCOC). The meeting was led by Major Purshotam Karki, Officiating Commander of Chitwan’s Batuk Dal Battalion.

There is nothing tentative about the man. His discipline is informed by his unflinching sense of purpose. He’s fighting fit and a perfectionist on every level, giving new meaning to the word “punctuality. He enjoys a good laugh. In fact, he has a great sense of humor.

Major Karki takes pride in the JCOC, as well he should. Evidence of the army’s success with digital technology throbs in the JCOC. Applications include a vehicle monitoring system, smart eye, CCTV surveillance, tower-based long-range cameras utilizing fiber optic cable, phones with IP signaling protocols, and radio collars (with VHF radio sets) for tracking endangered species. The army has introduced camera traps, used to capture images of wildlife with as little human interference as possible. (The cameras, interspersed throughout the jungle, are remotely activated with motion sensors.) Batuk Dal Battalion also operates a fleet of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs), better known as drones.

Particularly worth noting is the army’s Real Time Patrol System, which implements Near-field Communication protocols. In layman terms, the Real Time Patrol System enables two electronic devices – computers at the JCOC and the mobile phones of the jungle patrols – to link. The result is around-the-clock tracking of troops throughout the large reserve. Red pin-point lights blink on the computer-screen map indicating the exact locations of all troops in real time. This tracking system is invaluable, given the fact that the army conducts more than 170 patrols daily through a subtropical riverine terrain of almost unimaginable biological and botanical diversity.

Three extensive river systems – Narayani, Rapti and Reu – flow through the park. Its forests, which constitute 70% of the reserve, are primarily populated by sal, interspersed with khair (of the Acacia family), red silk cotton, sheesham (Indian rosewood) and other species unfamiliar to the Western eye. Natural pastures are also interspersed throughout the river floodplains with over 50 varieties of grasses, including the phenomenal elephant grass, which grows up to 20 feet in height.

Jungle, water, grassland: This is the backdrop for a lavish variety of zoological species, some of which are found nowhere else in the world: 68 mammals including One-Horned Rhinoceros, Royal Bengal Tiger and Asian Elephant; 49 reptiles – from pythons and cobras and other poisonous snakes to two rare crocodile varieties, marsh muggers and gharials; 120 types of fish; 576 types of birds, 22 of which are critically endangered; and 150 types of butterflies.

Chitwan has the distinction of being Nepal’s major habitat for Bengal Tigers. The latest count is 120.

But I hadn’t come to Chitwan to study tigers. I wanted to focus on the park’s Greater One-Horned Rhinoceros. Chitwan has the second largest population of one-horned rhinos in the world.

Rhinos, the Real Unicorns? A Death Sentence

Once widespread across the entire northern swath of the Indian sub-continent, the One-Horned Rhino population plummeted in the 1900s. Their numbers dwindled due to overhunting for sport, destruction of their habitat, and the increase in poaching. By the end of the 20th century, fewer than 200 Greater One-Horned Rhinos remained extant in Nepal.

The manner in which a poached rhino dies is barbaric. Since the poacher’s interest is primarily in the rhino’s horn and getting away from the scene of the crime as quickly and silently as possible, he often foregoes shooting the rhino, but rather hacks off the horn while the animal is still alive, leaving the rhino to slowly bleed to death.

Poaching syndicates can sell nearly all parts of the rhino as folk medicine, however. Dried tongue “cures” children with speech impediments. “Urine” cures asthma. Placed under an expectant mother’s pillow, rhino tail “allays labor pain”. Powdered rhino horn “reduces” fever and “stops” convulsions. The make-believe list goes on and on. All of these traditional remedies are void of applied-science corroboration but try telling that to racketeers making fortunes in China, other southeast Asian countries, and even in the Arabian Peninsula.

According to some estimates, nearly 40% of rhino horn is sold to Yemen, used for the handles of the men’ jambiyas, (short, curved daggers tucked into the front of their robes). In Yemen society, hilts carved from rhino horn connote a man’s wealth and presuppose his superior masculinity.

The newest country attracted to the fictional powers attributed to rhino horn – again, the nouveau riche phenomenon – is Viet Nam. According to The Atlantic, powdered rhino horn has become “the alcoholic drink of Vietnamese millionaires” promoted on the groundless belief that it cures cancer and is a panacea for overtaxed livers. A horn goes for around $300,000 in Viet Nam, giving it a cult-like luxury-item status. Among late-night club-goers, it’s “seen as a cocaine-like party drug.”

For the record, rhino horn is made up of keratin, a protein found in human hair and fingernails. The Vietnamese might as well sweep up barbershop clippings, put them in a blender, add booze, hit PUREE and gulp down the concoction. The resultant effect – nothing from the keratin, inebriation from the alcohol – will perfectly duplicate the drinking of a rhino-horn cocktail, replete with sky-bars, with two notable differences: The barbershop version is 1) dirt cheap and 2) doesn’t entail the slaughter of magnificent beasts.

Did Disney animations ever portray unicorns with as many make-believe properties as the ones attributed to One-Horned Rhinos? There’s a popular meme on the internet: “Unicorns are real. They’re just fat and grey and we call them rhinos.” The author of that joke may be closer to the truth than she or he realizes. The blurring of identity may be the source of the rhino’s vulnerability.

Did the fairy-tale belief in unicorns spring from bona fide ancestors of 21st-century rhinos? The Siberian Rhinoceros, (Elasmotherium sibiricum) – thought to have become extinct 300,000 years ago – was dramatically reevaluated in 2016, when paleontologists discovered partial remains in present-day Kazakhstan. Radiocarbon dating of the skull fossil adduced that it was alive as recently as 29,000 years ago. Although the discovery doesn’t pretend to suggest that the species was the source of the unicorn myth, it does remind prehistorians that one-horned rhinos lived at the same time as early humans, thereby providing a memory bank for future fables, believed to be popularized and promulgated during the classical Greek period. Even before that, the Ishtar Gate of ancient Babylon is adorned by what was thought by many as a unicorn.

Unicorn myth may be the rhino’s worst enemy. Obviously, it’s beyond Nepal Army’s purview to change the fads of foreign millionaires or eradicate universally treasured fairytales. What the army can do – what it is doing – is to adhere to a no-nonsense four-pronged operation: Protect the rhinos’ natural habitat, bring military might to the conservations’ programs, thwart poachers, and raise awareness within local buffer zone communities.

This strategy, as Major Karki proved in his briefing, has paid off. From less than 200 rhinos in Nepal in 2000, the count has risen to an astounding 645 in 2018, 605 of which reside in Chitwan National Park. Even more notable is the fact that the army has been able to celebrate Zero Poaching in 2011, 2013, 2015 and 2018. How this has come about is one of Asia’s greatest success stories in anti-poaching crusades.

In March 2018, I was embedded with armed patrols in the Bardiya and Chitwan National Parks. I advanced on foot, elephant, jeeps and river rafts to see firsthand the army’s tactical applications for protecting endangered species from human encroachment and poaching. A portion of PART ONE was published in this week's Nepali Times.

Tiger Burning Bright

9 am. It was my first morning in Bardiya National Park, the far-western Nepali jungle reserve where many of the last remaining Bengal Tigers, One-Horned Rhinos, Asian Elephants and other endangered species are free to roam. My mission was to advance with patrols of the army – on foot, in jeeps, in river rafts – to see firsthand the strategies and tactical applications for protecting Nepal’s wildlife preserves from poachers and smugglers.

I was embedded with Bardiya’s Shiva Dal Battalion. The morning began with a briefing by Battalion Commander Lt. Col. Tek Bahadur Chand, after which I headed out with a park conservationist and a dozen armed soldiers (nine men, three women). This was to be a routine military patrol with no surprises anticipated.

Our patrol commenced in bright light while traversing shallow brooks. Sal trees – the dominant tree species in the jungle – soon closed in. Their canopy stonewalled the sun. The track narrowed into a three-foot-wide path, forcing us to fall into single file. Except for the trill of small birds and boot crunch over leaf debris, there was absolute silence.

Thirty minutes into our march, Lt. Bikash Rayamajhi, the patrol leader, came to a halt.

To his right, six feet away, was a fully-grown Bengal tiger. Eye-to-eye contact. The lieutenant froze from the sheer proximity of the beast. A second later, pointing toward the animal, he alerted us: “Baagh.” Tiger.

I was fourth in line. I, too, found myself in shocked suspension. To my right, pushing through a dark green frame of foliage, was a quadrangle of orange fur. Breathing fur. Before I could gather my wits, the tiger roared.

How to explain a tiger’s roar at close quarters…

Ferocity on amps. It’s a deep-throated reverberation that rattles your ears and slams into your chest. The jungle is the tiger’s realm. His roar becomes a three-second lecture on primordial domination. Your spine becomes its sounding board. Your brain becomes its echo chamber. You are an idiotic trespasser. An upstart. A meat slab of inconsequential provenance.

Out of the corner of my eye I saw the squad rushing away in both directions. I scrambled after the soldiers to my rear. The last person to see the beast was the hindmost corporal, who glimpsed the tiger vault over hedge, then melt into shadows beyond.

Eventually, in a dappled glade, we regrouped, shaken and probably a little giddy from the unexpected spike of adrenalin. We stared at each other. It wasn’t just I who thought it was a big deal. Most of the squad had never seen wild tiger until that morning. They had been stationed in Bardiya for nearly a year, but tiger encounters were that rare.

One of the soldiers told me that there was a Nepali saying: “If you see a tiger in the wild, it will bring ten years of good luck.”

Maybe, but we were stuck in the moment, unified in our awe of a beast that could have easily mauled or snapped one of our necks. No laughing matter, of course, and yet it was impossible to suppress grins.

“Let’s go,” said the lieutenant. The hook of duty reasserted itself. The soldiers readjusted their rifles and we resumed our patrol through the jungle. Like the tiger’s unsuspected presence, much of the army’s contribution to conservation remains beyond the public’s imagination.

Nepal Army's History of Saving Wildlife

To use the tiger as an example, in the last century, 95% of the world’s Bengal Tiger habitat has disappeared. Depending on one’s source, the tiger population has dwindled to somewhere between 2,500 and 4,000. Their numbers are not recovering in Russia – once a stronghold for tigers – nor in most of Southeast Asia. Cambodia, Vietnam and China have completely lost their viable tiger populations. What remains are a few reserves in Thailand, India and Nepal.

Here’s the good news. Within these reserves, the tiger-population has increased in the last decade.

For a small developing country like Nepal, wildlife recovery is a remarkable achievement. Overcoming its history of slaughterhouse safaris, civil war and limited resources, the nation has every right to take pride in its current tiger tally: nearly 200 as of 2018. In spite of formidable obstacles, the number is growing and the world should take note of Nepal’s success.

Baagh shikar (tiger hunts, or put more bluntly, carnage disguised as “sport” among by-gone kings, maharajas and foreign dignitaries), was banned by Nepal’s government in 1972. In their heyday, baagh shikari (tiger hunters) slaughtered scores of tigers in a single day. After the ban, the government created conservation sanctuaries in collaboration with the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) and other non-governmental organizations.

In 1975, the Nepal Army was appointed to work in concert with the conservationists and that changed everything. The army’s collaboration has proven to be one of its most outstanding accomplishments. There are now 20 protected areas in Nepal covering 25% of Nepal’s landmass. The army is responsible for safeguarding 14 of the sanctuaries. In 2018, there are 15 battalions and companies with some 8000 troops protecting forest areas measuring 5,133 square miles.

That’s a lot of prime poaching real-estate, where preferred methods of further endangering species include guns, homemade weapons, covered pits used as traps, poisoning, electric shock, trained dogs – you name it: Murdering animals is a creative business.

Although poaching has always been an issue in Nepal, it spiked in the mid-1990s, when the rise of criminal organizations came into play. The black-market value for rhino horn, elephant tusk, and many other species’ body parts sky-rocketed.

Staying with the tiger for the moment, syndicates found it particularly profitable to catered to nouveau riche Chinese consumers. (Hǔ biān tang is one of the more repugnant examples. It’s a Chinese soup prepared with tiger penis, believed to guarantee virility. There is absolutely no scientific evidence to support the claim but, apparently, the Chinese craving for status overrules pharmaceutical facts. Today, the price for this quack-remedy-soup goes for around $400 per bowl in a Beijing restaurant.)

Also, the army’s anti-poaching efforts were severely hampered by the 10-year Maoist insurgency of 1996-2006. By 2000, the civil war had intensified to the point that large numbers of wildlife security forces were re-deployed to confront Maoist-rebel strongholds. Endangered species became defenseless. Likewise, deforestation became rampant. The United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) estimated that between 2000 and 2005, Nepal lost about 1650 square miles of forest cover.

The game-changer was the Comprehensive Peace Accord, signed in 2006.

The truce allowed troops to return to the sanctuaries. Anti-poaching efforts and protection of forests resumed with increased assertiveness. The result has been a dramatic increase in wildlife population and tough curtailment of human encroachment – as the roaring tiger of Bardiya was keen to remind me and my armed comrades.

The Karnali River

Confluence of Neolithic and 21st Century Technology

I and a seven-man armed patrol took two jeeps north of Army Headquarters to the Karnali River. Our drive ran parallel to the Karnali, but considerably above it. We were climbing and traversing – precariously – the southern flank of the Siwalki hills, which constitutes the outermost range of the Himalaya. The narrow grade had been cut out of a stone hillside and, by the time we attained some 500 feet above the river, the water directly below us was technicolor blue-green. The Karnali is the longest and most beautiful watercourse in Nepal: glacier fed, swift moving.

Our eight-man team was led by Lt. Bikash Rayamajhi. We unloaded our gear in the Buffer Zone, slightly north of the Bardiya National Park boundary. We carried our equipment 1/8 of a mile down to a sandy beach. On the other side of the river rose a thirty-foot bluff topped by khair trees. Herons watched in silence as we inflated the rubber raft.

We slid the raft into calm water. Bristling with paddles and firearms, the vessel was a tight fit for eight men. And the tranquility was misleading. A stretch of rapids awaited us not far downstream.

After we pushed off, Lt. Rayamajhi explained that the guardianship of buffer zones is almost as crucial as protecting the interior of the parks. Overseen by the country’s Buffer Zone Management Committee, Nepal Army acts as its boots-on-the-ground steward.

Cooperation from local villagers is vital. 50% of the Department of National Parks and Wildlife Conservation’s revenue comes from tourism, which is distributed to buffer-zone communities.

This is an important point. Sharing the tourism revenue encourages the natives to be more reliant on economic activities within their sectors, rather than illegally exploiting the natural resources inside the national parks. These and other strategies have proven to be effective.

Of course, community activism can never entirely preclude poaching, nor local animosity. I witnessed hostility downstream, but I’ll get to that in a moment.

The primary purpose of our raft patrol was to scout for clues of unwelcomed fishing. Bunched-up nets hidden among riverbank boulders was one give-away. When the locals cast these nets, they not only capture golden mahseer (carp) and catfish for food, they may also inadvertently entrap endangered aquatic species. At the top of the list is the Ganges River Dolphin.

Once endemic to Nepal, India and Bangladesh, the population of Ganges River dolphins has dwindled to fewer than 2,000 left in the wild, out of which fewer than 100 dolphins still swim Nepali waters. Decimated populations have been caused by incidental by-catches in fishing gear, deliberate killings for dolphin oil, reduction of natural prey, degradation of surrounding land, and damming of rivers for hydropower and irrigation. (It’s important to note that the Karnali is the only significant river in Nepal that has so far eluded damming, but that could change in the near future. There are at least four Karnali hydropower projects currently in pre-development.)

Our boat traversed the breadth of the Karnali, back and forth. (Armed raft patrols are irregularly scheduled to maintain the element of surprise.) My eagle-eyed companions spotted, then confiscated nets along and above the shorelines. We stored them under our feet, shoved off from the embankments and moved on.

At one point, two fishermen came rushing down from a steep bluff punching their fists in the air and hurtling insults at us. There was a rock ledge that slanted down to our landing spot, but the men stopped short of nearing the raft. The patrol didn’t seem unduly concerned. To be sure, they were attentive but their firearms remained cradled in their laps. What could the fishermen do but spew condemnation as we receded into the distance, their confiscated gear securely weighted down by our boots? On the one hand, I sympathized with the two guys, whose meager income relied solely on fishing. On the other hand, they had seen the army’s tactics before: Had I been in their place, I would have taken the precaution of hiding my nets in the forest above.

The river grew much wider downstream, almost a third-of-a-mile across. Except for the plunge of oars, silence prevailed. No motorboats to break the silence or pollute the water, I observed with great satisfaction. And just when I had convinced myself that I had been transported into a world free from 21st century intrusion, the magnificent steel contours of the Karnali Bridge rose into view.

The bridge is single-towered, cable-stayed and spans 1640 feet. It is the longest of its type in Nepal, built with Japanese assistance. We paddled under the bridge’s beautiful contours, where a dozen or so dugouts bobbled in and out of the span’s shadow.

15-20 feet long, dugouts are sculpted from single tree trunks. They are the oldest boats yet discovered by paleontologist, dating back to 8000 years ago.

The juxtaposition of the lofty bridge and Stone Age dugouts caught me off-guard. It reminded me that, in spite of modern technology, Nepal remained harnessed to antiquity. It’s one of the charms – some would say curses – of Nepal. I was rooting for a Nepal that could develop without losing its ancient heritage. “At least there are no motorboats,” I murmured to Lt. Rayamajhi.

“Oh, the Karnali has motorboats. It’s one of the reasons river dolphins are so few, especially this far downstream.”

So much for naïve American pastoralism.

To what extent will technology be able to work hand-in-hand with Nepali tradition? The pace and parameters of change will determine the well-being of Nepal’s inherited wild kingdom.

A balance is possible, however. I saw this in the way the military collaborated with conservationists with the help of technology. And nowhere was this more evident than at Chitwan National Park, the next sanctuary I would visit as a guest of the Nepal Army.

To be continued...PART TWO will be posted June 18th and PART THREE will be posted June 21st.

Elizabeth Hawley, who died in Kathmandu on 26 January 2018 aged 94 years, was an American journalist living in Nepal since 1960, regarded as the undisputed authority on mountaineering in Nepal. She was famed worldwide as a ‘one-woman mountaineering institution’ because of her systematic compilation of a detailed Himalayan database of expeditions still maintained today by her team of volunteers, and published by the American Alpine Club.

Respected for her astute political antennae and famously formidable, Miss Hawley represented Time Life and later Reuters since 1960 as Nepal correspondent. She is credited with mentoring reporters and setting journalistic standards in Nepal, competing to file stories from the communications-challenged Nepal of the 1960s. She worked with the pioneer adventure tourism operators, Tiger Tops, from its inception in 1965 with John Copeman, until she retired as AV Jim Edward’s trusted adviser in 2007.

She managed the Himalayan Trust for Sir Edmund Hillary since it started in the mid-1960s, dispensing funds to build hospitals, schools, bridges, forest nurseries and scholarships for the people of the Everest region. Generations of Sherpas remember being overawed by the rigour of Miss Hawley’s interviews, and quake at the memory of her cross-examinations when collecting their scholarship funds.

Hillary described Elizabeth Hawley as “a most remarkable person ... a woman of great courage and determination.” She served as New Zealand Honorary Consul to Nepal for 20 years until retiring in 2010.

Elizabeth first came to Nepal via India for a couple of weeks in February 1959. She was on a two-year round the world trip that took her to Eastern Europe, the Middle East and South Asia. Bored with her job as researcher-reporter with Fortune magazine in New York, she had cashed her savings to travel as long as they lasted. Nepal had been on her mind since reading a 1955 New York Times article about the first tourists who visited the kingdom.

Because of her media contacts, the Time Life Delhi bureau chief asked her to report on Nepal’s politics. It was an interesting time -- as one of only four foreign journalists, she was present when King Mahendra handed over the first parliamentary constitution, which paved the way for democracy in Nepal. Fascinated by Nepal’s politics and the idea of an isolated country emerging into the modern 20th century, she returned in 1960 and never left, living in the same Dilli Bazar apartment, the same blue Volkswagen Beetle car, and generations of faithful retainers.

A diminutive figure of slight build with a keen look, Elizabeth was bemused at the universal attention she received. Her Himalayan Database expedition records are trusted by mountaineers, newswires, scholars, and climbing publications worldwide, published by Richard Salisbury and the American Alpine Club. She was one of only 25 honorary members of the Alpine Club of London, and has been formally recognised by the New Zealand Alpine Club and the Nepal Mountaineering Association. In 2004 she received the Queen's Service Medal for Public Services for her work as New Zealand honorary consul and executive officer of Sir Edmund Hillary’s Himalayan Trust. She was awarded the King Albert I Memorial Foundation medal and was the first recipient of the Sagarmatha National Award from the Government of Nepal.

Elizabeth’s career in the collection of mountaineering data started by accident: “I’ve never climbed a mountain, or even done much trekking.” As part of her Reuters’ job, she began to report on mountaineering activities and in those pioneering days of first ascents and mountain exploration, there was strong media interest in Himalayan expeditions. She relied heavily on the knowledge of mountaineer Col Jimmy Roberts, founder of Mountain Travel.

Since 1963 she has met every expedition to the Nepal Himalaya both before and after their ascents, including those who climbed from Tibet. Her records contain detailed information about more than 20,000 ascents of about 460 Nepali peaks, including those that border with China and India. Over the course of some 7,000 expedition interviews, her research work has sparked and resolved controversies. Elizabeth has seen the Nepal mountaineering scene transformed from an exclusive club to a mainstream obsession.

Elizabeth did not suffer fools gladly. Though some mountaineers were intimidated by her interrogations -- sometimes jokingly referred to as an expedition's ‘second summit’, serious alpinists greatly admired her. "If I need information about climbing 8,000-meter peaks, I used to go to her," recalls Italian climbing legend Reinhold Messner. Nepali trek operator and environmentalist Dawa Steven Sherpa underlines the point: "Although it's the authorities that should have been doing this, they're not as strict or accurate as Miss Hawley. One of her biggest contributions is keeping mountaineers honest."

Elizabeth applied her trademark scrupulous precision to summarising the political and development events in Nepal in her monthly diary, published in 2015 in two volumes as The Nepal Scene: Chronicles of Elizabeth Hawley --1988-2007The Nepal Scene: Chronicles of Elizabeth Hawley 1988-2007. They stand as a faithful and unique historical record of the extraordinary changes that took place in Nepal over nearly two decades.

Her enviable journalistic sources were based on long friendships with the political, panchayat and Rana elite. She had the confidence of a wide range of prominent Nepalis, and shared a hairdresser with the Queen. Educated as a historian, Elizabeth regarded herself as a reporter not a writer, stringently recording Nepal’s political and mountaineering facts with minimal opinion or analysis. Although there is no disguising her liberal bent and her admiration for the force of democracy.

Former American Ambassador Peter Bodde said, Elizabeth Hawley was one of Nepal’s “living treasures ... her contribution to the depth of knowledge and understanding between Nepal and the US was immense.”

Elizabeth Hawley’s achievements have featured in many books and articles about Nepal, and her biography by Bernadette McDonald, I’ll Call You in Kathmandu, was published in 2005, then updated and reprinted as Keeper of the Mountains. In 2013, to mark the 60th anniversary of the first ascent of Everest, Elizabeth was featured in the award-winning US television documentary of the same name, produced by Allison Otto. On screen in Keeper of the Mountains, her straightforward manner and fearless modesty made her something of a cult classic. In 2014 the Nepal government named a 6,182 m peak in honour of her contribution to mountaineering. Elizabeth was not impressed: "I thought it was just a joke. Mountains should not be named after people."

Miss Elizabeth Hawley is the last of the first generation of foreigners who made their life in Nepal, single and determinedly independent. She is survived by her nephew Michael Hawley Leonard and has bequeathed her library and records to the American Alpine Club. As both a successful woman in a man’s world and a highly visible foreigner recording Nepal’s history, we are all in her debt. She defied the conventions of her time, and determined to live life on her own terms and in her own incomparable style.

Lisa Choegyal is a tourism specialist and was a longtime associate of Ms. Hawley, working with her at Tiger Mountain and subsequently as New Zealand Honorary Consul. Choegyal has several books to her credit, including Kathmandu Valley Style and Afghanistan Revisited, as well as serving as co-editor of The Nepal Scene: Chronicles of Elizabeth Hawley -- 1988-2007.

A great loss to the international mountaineering community: The ultimate authority on Himalayan ascents, Elizabeth Hawley passed on Jan. 26 in Kathmandu. Alpine A-listers know no one will ever fill her shoes. A tribute to her life-long work was published today in Nepali Times. It includes a video and a brief explanation of how I came to work with Elizabeth.

Statements emanating from the recent Chinese Communist party congress suggest a calcified policy in Tibet, thus potentially increasing pressure on India with regard to the Dalai Lama and the Central Tibetan Administration in Dharamsala. The following analysis was written by colleague Jayadeva Ranade, former additional secretary in the Cabinet Secretariat, Government of India, is currently President, Centre for China Analysis and Strategy.

The week-long (October 18 to 24, 2017) 19th Congress of the Chinese Communist Party, which was held in Beijing, concluded as anticipated with Xi Jinping emerging considerably stronger.

For those watching the congress for clues as to Xi's policies towards China's ethnic minorities and especially Tibet and Xinjiang, there appears little prospect of any relaxation of controls.

In fact, the emphatic assertions during the congress that China will safeguard its sovereignty and territorial integrity were reinforced by a letter publicized a couple of days ago and ostensibly written by two Tibetan village girls to Xi during the congress. The girls, Zhoigar and Yangzom, had written describing life in Yumai, Lhunze county, China's smallest town. Xinhua, China's official news agency, reported that Xi replied, asking them 'to set down roots in the border area, safeguard Chinese territory and develop their hometown'.

Saying 'Without peace in the territory, there will be no peaceful lives for the millions of families,' Xi expressed the hope that 'the family would motivate more herders to set down roots in the border area' and become 'guardians of Chinese territory and constructors of a happy hometown'.

Xi's reply, which contained the assurance that the Communist party would look after ethnic minorities, endorsed ongoing efforts by authorities of the Tibet Autonomous Region to co-opt villagers in guarding the border.

While neither Tibet nor the Dalai Lama were specifically mentioned in Xi's lengthy 32,000-character Work Report presented to the congress on October 18, there were repeated references to 'split-ism' and 'separatism'.

China's new and potentially tougher policy on the Tibet issue was, however, spelt out in the course of the congress.

Xinhua reported on October 21 that at a press conference on the sidelines of the congress, Zhang Yijiong -- vice minister of the Communist party central committee's United Front Work Department and its executive deputy head who was promoted at the congress as a full central committee member, reaffirmed China's opposition to the Dalai Lama's visits to foreign countries.

Asserting that 'the 14th Dalai Lama is not only a religious figure, but also a political one,' Zhang made a remark with implications for India.

'After fleeing China in 1959,' Zhang noted, 'he established a so-called government-in-exile, whose goal and core agenda is the independence of Tibet and to separate (from) China. For decades, the group headed by the 14th Dalai Lama has never stopped such attempts.'

An epic journey: The day the Dalai Lama came to India

'As head of the group, the 14th Dalai Lama has never stopped his activities in this regard over the past decades,' Zhang added.

The statement suggests potentially increasing pressure on India with regard to the Central Tibetan Administration in Dharamsala.

In an apparent toughening of the current policy, Zhang also warned foreign officials against meeting the Dalai Lama, saying they 'can't get away by saying they were meeting the exiled Tibetan leader in a personal capacity as they still represent their governments'.

Announcing that 'Any country, or any organization of anyone, accepting to meet with the Dalai Lama, in our view, is a major offence to the sentiment of the Chinese people,' Zhang expressed the Chinese government's 'firm opposition' to such meetings, adding, 'We consider such visits as a severe insult to the feelings of the Chinese people.'

Interestingly, amidst reports of restrictions imposed by authorities on the movement and teachings especially by Tibetan Buddhist monks and nuns inside China, Zhang observed that Tibetan Buddhism was a special religion 'born in our ancient China. It is a Chinese religion. It didn't come in from the outside.'

Zhang, who worked in the Tibet Autonomous Region from 2006 to 2010 as a deputy party secretary, thus hinted that China's policy towards Tibetan Buddhists would endure.

His remark implicitly pointed to the authority of China's 'patriotic associations' which supervise all religions in China and the Chinese government's authority in religious matters concerning Tibetan Buddhism.

Cadres at the Chinese Communist party's new central committee secretariat and politburo with a background of Tibet affairs will have substantive inputs on China's policy on Tibet.

The secretariat is headed by Wang Huning who has in the past been a member of Tibet Autonomous Region delegations to the National People's Congress and is now a member of the Politburo Standing Committee, China's highest political unit.

Other members are Yang Xiaodu, till recently minister of supervision who served in the Tibet Autonomous Region from 1976 to 2001, and Guo Shengkun who as minister of public security is familiar with the Tibet issue and attended meetings of the leading small work group on Tibet.

Three of the secretariat's members are individuals with a background in security or the military -- Yang Xiaodu, Guo Shengkun and Huang Kunming, indicating a potential bias favouring progressively tougher Communist party controls.

Among others who will influence Tibet policy are Politburo member Chen Quanguo, handpicked by Xi in August 2011 to be Tibet Autonomous Region party secretary and now the party secretary of the Xinjiang-Uyghur Autonomous Region; Sun Chunlan who continues as politburo member and heads the United Front Work Department; Zhang Qingli, the central committee who made the infamous remark describing the Dalai Lama as 'a sheep in wolf's clothing and with the heart of a beast'.

Interestingly, while the number of ethnic minorities cadres in the central committee has dropped from 39 in the previous committee to 15 in the current committee, the Tibet Autonomous Region has been granted increased representation in the committee.

Tibet Autonomous Region Party Secretary Wu Yingjie is a full member of the central committee. The number of ethnic Tibetans has also increased with Qi Zhala (Chedak) and Luosang Jiangcun (Lobsang Gyaltsen) both being made full members of the committee.

Chedak or Qi Zhala -- who earlier this year replaced Lobsang Gyaltsen as chairman of the Tibet Autonomous Region government and prior to that was party secretary of Lhasa municipality, a position usually occupied by a Han -- is a first-time member of the central committee.

Lobsang Gyaltsen or Luosang Jiangcun is perhaps the senior-most Tibetan in the Chinese Communist Party and is currently chairman of the standing committee of the Tibet Autonomous Region Congress. He was an alternate member of the previous central committee.

The World Bank’s Nepal Development Update (NDU) is produced twice yearly with the following two main aims: to report on key economic developments over the preceding months, placing them in a longer term and global perspective; and to examine (in the Special Focus section) topics of particular policy significance. In the Special Focus of this edition, (released September 15, 2017), the NDU takes a closer look at the main emerging issues and potential risks in the design of fiscal architecture for the new federal Nepal. Below, is a condensed version of the report.

As Nepal prepares for an ambitious shift from a unitary to a federal system of government, closer attention to sequencing political, financial and administrative decentralization will be key, says the World Bank in its latest Nepal Development Update. Starting in FY2018, a large proportion of federal spending is expected to be passed on to subnational governments, ultimately increasing public spending. However, the Update cautions that unresolved issues surrounding the implementation of the new federal architecture could challenge budget execution, particularly during the upcoming year.

Nepal’s new fiscal federalism system suggests a marked asymmetry between stronger decentralization of spending responsibilities and relatively unchanged low decentralization of tax collection powers, notes the Update. Similar imbalances hold true between regions across the country.

“The subnational governments will play an increasingly critical role in Nepal’s public expenditures,” said Takuya Kamata, the World Bank’s Country Manager for Nepal. “A system of fiscal transfers that is designed for transparency and predictability and supported by a small set of simple rules, could go a long way in helping meet the development objectives of federal Nepal,” he said.

The Update makes four key observations:

Many functional assignments are “shared” among the three levels of government. A negotiated delineation of devolved responsibilities are critical first steps. A detailed costing of devolved responsibility will also be critical.

The resulting mismatch between revenue collection and service provision could be closed through inter-governmental transfers. Having a transparent, evidence-based formula for equalization among provinces is critical to design an effective depoliticized process.

The constitution makes adequate provisions for prudent debt management in a decentralized system. However, these provisions could be developed in greater detail though a fiscal responsibility-type law that provides clear, simple, yet flexible rules for behavior of different levels of government. In addition, the creation and deployment of accounting and debt reporting systems should remain critical short-term priorities.

Meanwhile, in its semi-annual assessment of economic performance, the Update notes that economic activity in Nepal, which rebounded strongly in FY2017, has been impacted once again by severe floods affecting over a third of the country. Damaging floods in mid-August are likely to affect agriculture, economic activity, and poverty reduction efforts even up to FY2018.

“Economic growth is expected to be lower than earlier forecast and is expected to average 4.5 percent over the next two fiscal years” says Sudyumna Dahal, World Bank Economist and principal author of the Update. The floods have affected over 5 percent of the total population, with several districts recording the heaviest rainfall in 60 years. Over 80 percent of land in the southern Tarai, country’s food basket, was affected. Estimates of destroyed crops at 64,000 hectares will likely lead to a weak agricultural output in FY2018.

Government revenue collection in FY2017 reached a new record, while government spending accelerated as well. However, more than 60 percent of the capital budget was spent in the last quarter of the fiscal year while expenditure remained significantly below the planned budget, a perennial problem in Nepal. The era of balanced budgets has ended with the fiscal deficit reaching an estimated 3.3 percent of GDP in FY2017 and expected to increase going forward as well.

Additionally, the current account, which turned into a deficit in FY2017, is also expected to deteriorate further in FY2018. Import growth should remain strong, while growth of exports and remittances are expected to remain sluggish. Recorded departures of migrant workers have continued to slow, reaching a five-year low in FY2017. Given the geopolitical tensions between Gulf Cooperation Council countries and Qatar—a major destination of migrant workers—departures are not expected to improve significantly.

In June 2017, a military standoff occurred between China and India as China attempted to extend a road on the Doklam plateau southwards – a disputed area. Doklam is near the Doka La pass and Indian troops moved in to prevent the Chinese from building a road that could allow Chinese troops to cut India’s access to its northeastern states. Bhutan formally objected to China's road construction in the disputed area and India deployed troops on behalf of Bhutan, with which it has a close relationship.

Doklam is an area with a plateau and a valley, lying between Tibet's Chumbi Valley to the north, Bhutan's Ha Valley to the east and India's Sikkim state to the west. It has been depicted as part of Bhutan in the Bhutanese maps since 1961, but it is also claimed by China. The area is of strategic importance to all three countries.

During the Doklam stand-off, China’s state-owned propaganda apparatus mounted an unprecedented offensive not seen in over forty years and which revealed that the Chinese Communist leadership cared little about improving Sino-Indian ties and had scant regard for Indian sensitivities.

The disengagement, which recently took place, came just before Prime Minister Narendra Modi was scheduled to travel to Xiamen in China for the BRICS summit from September 3 to 5.

The following editorial was published in the Hindustan Times, Aug. 29, 2017; written by Jayadeva Ranade. Ranade is a former additional secretary in the cabinet secretariat, Government of India and is presently president of the Centre for China Analysis and Strategy.

The announcement in Beijing and New Delhi on August 28, 2017, of a simultaneous disengagement of Indian and Chinese troops – who had faced-off on the high altitude Doklam Plateau for three months – is a welcome first step. It came after China continuously insisted for three months that the disputed 89 sq. km Doklam Plateau is Chinese territory and made a variety of threats against India of the kind not seen in the past forty years. After a disingenuous initial statement implying that Indian troops alone had withdrawn, China later, in reply to a specific question, clarified that troops from both sides had pulled back. India separately announced that the bulldozers and earthmoving equipment brought by the Chinese had been removed, making it apparent that China has undertaken to cease building the road to Gyemochen through the Doklam Plateau, which was the main reason for India’s objection.

While China and pro-Chinese analysts will now talk of looking ahead and continuing relations as before, the fact remains that China’s unrelenting propaganda over the past three months has damaged the relationship. It has dissipated what little trust existed in the Sino-Indian relationship, rebuilding which will require a long time. More important is the need for a change in China’s attitude towards India – a point made by Prime Minister Modi in his talk at China’s prestigious Peking University during his visit to Beijing in April 2015.

China’s track record in abiding by agreements has, however, been dodgy. Ready recent examples are (1) its reneging within three years in 2008 on the agreement by which it accepted Sikkim as a state of the Indian Union; (2) backing off from the agreement on not disturbing ‘settled populations’ which pertained to Arunachal Pradesh; and (3), most recently, violating the 2012 agreement not to alter the status quo and cease building the road through the Doklam Plateau. China has not hesitated to go back on agreements with other countries either.

The Doklam stand-off has far reaching implications. It differed markedly from previous stand-offs including others that actually lasted considerably longer. During the Doklam stand-off, China’s state-owned propaganda apparatus mounted an unprecedented offensive not seen in over forty years and which revealed that the Chinese Communist leadership cared little about improving Sino-Indian ties and had scant regard for Indian sensitivities. Memories of the threats are unlikely to recede for a very long while. It ensured world attention on the stand-off at Doklam. The stand-off also triggered adverse reaction in India which, already upset at the US$ 52 billion trade deficit, has begun scrutinizing Chinese commercial activity in India.

Countries in India’s immediate neighborhood, like Pakistan and Nepal, have closely monitored developments surrounding Doklam with both, pointedly, staying silent. Both can be expected to reassess their policies towards India, while Pakistan will additionally re-evaluate China’s reliability. Islamabad will have noted China’s assessment that US President Trump’s recent announcement on Afghanistan and terrorism increases pressure on Pakistan and heralds a realignment in geopolitics of the region.

In the wider Indo-Pacific region too India will be seen as the only power to have stood up to China’s aggressive policies. Recognition is Japan’s, and later US endorsement, of India’s stand. In effect, India challenged China at Doklam and paused the seeming momentum Beijing had created to aggressively expand strategic space and territory, thereby denting Beijing’s image.

Military and political considerations have been important. China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) was in an untenable position at Doklam. India’s swift and robust response was unexpected and caught the Chinese unprepared. In the ten days prior to Beijing going public with news of the stand-off, there were undoubtedly deliberations in the PLA and Chinese Communist Party (CCP)’s top leadership echelons leading to the decision to try and browbeat India into submission and, if necessary, use military force. India’s refusal to yield ground, or seek to compromise its way out as anticipated by China on the basis of past record, would have prompted the rethink to opt for de-escalation.

Finally, the important 19th Party Congress scheduled to be held in October-November 2017, makes Xi Jinping politically vulnerable. Xi Jinping has used ideology and nationalism as his main instruments to strengthen the CCP’s monopoly on power and boost his personal authority. He is also in the midst of implementing the most extensive reform the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) has seen in its 90 years of existence, and could not afford to take the chance that in case he orders the PLA to ‘teach India a lesson’ it is unable to secure a decisive victory or suffers a bloody nose. Smarting at the setback, the PLA and Xi Jinping will in all probability look for a way to retrieve hurt pride.

Five years ago, Debendra Pokharel launched Cocina Mitho Chha, a “sustainable social enterprise”, located in Lazimpat. Situated just off Diplomatic Row, it’s a world unto itself – a haven from the bustle and noise of the metropolis surrounding it.

Debendra, originally from Gorkha, has established a fine restaurant with indoor-outdoor seating separated by a small garden. Flanking it is a seven-room bed and breakfast, the guests of which seem to have settled into the city for extended stays. The overall feeling is one of intimacy – of finding oneself in a family-run lodge with the inherent hospitality one might expect in a Gorkhan village. And what further distinguishes Cocina Mitho Chha from other places in the capital is that it provides hotel training for young people from local orphanages.

Courses are offered in Cooking, Food, Beverage and Barista service, Front Hotel Business Office Skills and Housekeeping. Courses are designed to last between 15 days & 6 months for up to 10 young people. All funds to support the running of the school and the scholarship program are raised from the restaurant and the B&B.

The results of the staff's efforts get to the yummy part. Cocina Mitho Chha’s menu offers freshly prepared food produced by Debendra’s organic greenhouse in the Valley and augmented by local produce.

The dishes are primarily Nepali, although immaculately prepared European and Asian dishes are recommended as well. Just ask Debendra and he’ll be delighted to show you around the kitchen and introduce you to his staff.

For Nepalis and Westerners alike, I strongly recommend popping into Cocina Mitho Chha for lunch...

...or, better yet, for a delicious leisurely dinner and drinks under an evening sky.

It’s the perfect setting – as casual as it gets! – for fine dining with family and friends, for kicking back in an unpretentious and soulful setting. It’s one of my favorite Nepali haunts.

Written by my colleague JAYADEVA RANADE, soon to be published by the Centre for China Analysis and Strategy.

Especially since the 18th Party Congress in November 2012 and as China moves to convene the 19th Party Congress in November 2017, there has been a steady hardening of the Chinese State. Political stability and regime survival have been top on the Party agenda and to ensure this Xi Jinping has introduced progressively restrictive domestic measures and promoted the rise in nationalism.

The first sign of its toughening stance was the Party conferring on Xi Jinping China’s three top positions of General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) Central Committee (CC), Chairman of the Central Military Commission (CMC) and President of the People’s Republic of China (PRC), simultaneously for the first time in thirty years! The other was the installation in a now reduced 7-member Politburo Standing Committee (PBSC) of stolid, doctrinaire apparatchiks. The backdrop to this was the unprecedented domestic political scrabbling for top positions by senior CCP cadres witnessed through 2011-2012 when Politburo (PB) member Bo Xilai attempted to usurp the top position. The failed bid by Wang Lijun, Bo Xilai’s chief of public security in Chongqing Municipality a position equivalent to a central Vice Minister, to defect to the US also severely jolted the Party’s top echelons as it revealed that the CCP ‘nomenklatura’ had been penetrated by the West.

The 18th Party Congress – a watershed in contemporary Chinese politics – consequently hammered out the unequivocal message of stability, assertive policies, Party supremacy and the ‘China Dream’.

Xi Jinping has used nationalism and ideology to promote political stability and regime survival. He consolidated his position and today chairs thirteen central leading groups overseeing all crucial aspects of the state including direct control over the security apparatus, military, cyber security and the economy. Xi Jinping’s titles are: General Secretary of the Central Committee (CC) of the CCP; Chairman of the Central Military Commission (CMC); President of the People’s Republic of China (PRC); Leader of the Central Leading Group for Foreign Affairs; Leader of the Central Leading Group for Taiwan Affairs; Head of the Central Leading Group for Comprehensively Deepening Reforms; Chairman of the Central National Security Commission; Head of the Central Leading Group for Internet Security and Informatisation; Leader of the Central Leading Group for National Defence and Military Reform; Head of the Central Leading Group for Financial and Economic Affairs; Commander-in-Chief of the Joint Battle Command of the PLA; and since January 2017, Chairman of the Central Commission for Integrated Military and Civilian Development. He now holds more formal positions than any CCP leader including Mao Zedong or Deng Xiaoping.

Xi Jinping has paid special attention to the People’ Liberation Army (PLA). Among the main reasons are: the rampant corruption in the PLA where ranks were purchased and officers operated ‘illegal’ businesses; the existence of lobbies owing loyalty to retired veteran leaders; ousted PB member Bo Xilai’s success in creating a lobby in the PLA to support his personal ambitions; and persistent propaganda by outside ‘foreign forces’ and ‘liberal’ elements inside China that the PLA is an army of the State and not the Party. Attention was buttressed by Xi Jinping’s conviction that the Soviet Union had actually “disarmed” the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) by designating the Soviet Army as a national army. Within a day of being appointed Chairman of the CMC, Xi Jinping moved to tighten the Party’s grip on the PLA and discipline the PLA. At an enlarged meeting of the CMC he declared that political reliability would be the key determining criteria for promotions.

At the Third Party Plenum convened in October 2013, Xi Jinping brought the PLA within the ambit of the Party’s watchdog anti-corruption body, the Central Discipline Inspection Commission (CDIC), as part of his effort to discipline the PLA and eliminate resistance to its restructuring and reform. CDIC investigators soon uncovered instances of corruption in the PLA and arrests of senior officers followed. Many PLA officers of and above the rank of Major General/Rear Admiral committed suicide while under investigation to ensure that their families received the benefits due. By September 2016, official reports stated that 86 PLA officers of the rank of Major General or above had been dismissed on charges of corruption. An additional 50 PLA officers of the rank of Major General or above were retired in January 2017. By the end of 2016, a total of 4,300 PLA officers, or over 30 per cent of the PLA officer corps, were under investigation for corruption. In March 2017, the official news agency Xinhua publicised that a total of 4,885 PLA officers had been ‘punished’ for graft. There is a high degree of popular support inside China for Xi Jinping in his campaign against corruption in the PLA. The campaign additionally allows Xi Jinping to build a loyal band of at least 135 PLA officers whom he will promote to the rank of Major General and above, strengthens the Party’s grip on the PLA and, ensures that PLA officers unquestioningly obey Xi Jinping and the CCP.

Party control on the PLA was stressed again most recently on April 27, 2017, when Xi Jinping visited the Southern Theatre Command and asked the PLA to strengthen ideology and ensure that it “resolutely follows the command of the CCP CC”. He pointedly, asked officers to “eliminate the impact” of Guo Boxiong and Xu Caihou. Such references almost 5 years after Guo Boxiong and Xu Caihou were punished suggest that their influence and that of their mentor, former CCP CC General Secretary Jiang Zemin, along with effects of their corrupt practices continue to linger. The continuing existence of problems in the PLA was highlighted by a PLA Daily commentary in March 2017, which asserted that "malpractice, including spreading political rumors, reckless comments on the Party's theories and policies, and participation of illegal associations should all be prohibited and punished"! Nonetheless, Xi Jinping has been successfully pushing through the most extensive and far reaching reforms to streamline and restructure the PLA since its founding.

Within days of the Party Congress, Xi Jinping began tackling problems within the Party including corruption, a lazy work-style and ostentation. He introduced a practice of obtaining feedback from the people and colleagues to assess the potential of a cadre. Standards for admission to the Party were sought to be enhanced and Xi Jinping told Party cadres that the emphasis should be on better quality and not increasing numbers. In October 2016, the government announced that more than a million of the 88 million Party members had been investigated in the past three years during an intense campaign against corruption. By early this year, 176 Party cadres of the rank of Vice Minister and above had been dismissed on charges of corruption. The Party mouthpiece People’s Daily complained in October 2016 against “lazy, foot-dragging officials” who were too “scared to do their jobs for fear of being accused of taking bribes, while others were unwilling to act unless the kickbacks resumed”. It added that “those who complain or are nostalgic for the good old days? Well, they are just “rotten with corruption!” Xi Jinping also cut the budget of the Communist Youth League (CYL) and initiated a programme to reduce its membership. At the same time he initiated an austerity campaign to tackle corruption and ostentation in the Party and mandated a regime of ‘one soup, four dishes’ at banquets. A large number of restaurants and hotels have consequently closed down, but the austerity measures remain in place despite the estimated annual 2-4 per cent adverse impact on GDP.

The economy is a major factor affecting society and China’s internal situation. The slowdown in growth has been faster than anticipated and the forecast for economic growth in 2017 is now officially pegged at 6.5 per cent, described by Premier Li Keqiang as the minimum essential for job creation. Very few of the 300 reforms decided upon at the Third Party Plenum in 2013 have progressed. The 106 central State owned Enterprises (SoEs) have been particularly resistant to reform not least because most are headed by ‘princelings’. For example, while rules recommended a cap on salaries of senior SoE executives, the SoEs were permitted to themselves determine the salaries. The shutting down of ‘zombie’ enterprises, often owned by SoEs, has also made tardy progress with pilot projects being undertaken in Shanghai. Some major decisions have, however, been taken such as to lay off 5 - 6 million workers in the coal, steel and mining industries between 2016 - 2018. Official Chinese media reports say that protests by workers have increased by an estimated 30 per cent over the 210,000 reported officially in 2010. Graduate unemployment is up by 30 per cent adding to the levels of popular dissatisfaction. Early this year, responding to complaints by graduates of the lack of jobs, officials said there were adequate jobs but not of the kind the graduates wanted!

Reports of regular protests by veteran demobilised soldiers have surfaced and with 300,000 more demobilised soldiers likely to soon join their ranks the number of protests could increase. Hundreds of Chinese military veterans demonstrated in mid February 2017, outside the Central Discipline Inspection Commission (CDIC) in central Beijing for two days, demanding unpaid retirement benefits. A smaller number protested outside the Ministry of Civil Affairs the following day. In October 2016, more than 1,000 veterans demonstrated outside the Defence Ministry headquarters in Beijing.

Income inequality is also growing. Latest official Chinese figures state that while disparity between provinces is gradually reducing, the gap between the poor and rich is widening. As publicised during the National People’s Congress (NPC) session in March 2017, one third of China’s wealth is owned by the top one percent households. There is also a lack of confidence in the country’s economy as evidenced by the continuing flight of capital. The People’s Bank of China (PBoC) estimated that US$ 1 trillion has fled the country since 2015!

Poverty is causing considerable concern. At the Politburo meeting on February 22, 2017, President Xi Jinping underscored the importance of “precision in the battle against poverty, saying that poverty relief targets should be accomplished as scheduled”. Poverty alleviation was the focus again at the Politburo meeting on March 31, 2017, as well as the NPC session that month. To highlight the leadership’s concern, Xi Jinping has nominated himself as a delegate to the 19th Congress from Guizhou, China’s poorest province.

Very high on the list of concerns of the CCP’s higher echelons are the perceived destabilisation efforts, or ‘Colour Revolution’, by the West. Early in April 2013, the CCP CC issued Document No. 9, which quoted Xi Jinping as saying “regime dissatisfaction often begins in the realm of ideas”. He complained of an intensification of western cultural and ideological infiltration. The CCP launched a campaign to counter such elements. In January 2015, the CCP CC issued Document No. 30 strengthening Party control over primary and secondary schools and universities. Also in January 2015, the PRC Education Minister prohibited the use of western sources for teaching and western books began being weeded out of university and college libraries.

In the third week of December 2016, a seven-and-a-half minute video issued by the CCP CC Propaganda Department focussed on the dangers of a 'Colour Revolution' of which, it said "Embassies in China are the forward command, combining forces to promote street politics". The video, which has no title, was propagated online under the head "Who most wants to overthrow China". The theme was highlighted in a high-level conference in December 2016 to discuss strengthening of ideological controls in Universities. During the conference China's Minister of Education, Chen Baosheng observed that "the first option for hostile forces infiltrating us is our education system". He added "To wreck your future, first of all they wreck your schools". Hongkong was singled out as a "bridgehead" for subversion. The video ended with the assertion that "Thoroughly expelling 'colour revolution' will be a long war, but if there is war, we will answer the call".

Reflecting the CCP leadership’s concern, the 442,000 foreign students studying in China have also -- for the first time -- been formally brought within the purview of the Party’s controls. On June 5, 2017, China's Ministries of Education, Foreign Affairs and Public Security jointly issued new regulations which mandate that foreign students pursuing higher education diplomas in China will have to take compulsory courses in Chinese. They require universities and colleges to teach international students about China’s laws and regulations, plus its institutions and traditional Chinese culture and customs and require international students majoring in philosophy and politics to take compulsory political theories courses. The regulations state they were made to “regulate schools’ admission, the cultivation and management of international students and for the convenience of international students studying in schools in China”. The regulations ban any form of religious activities on campus, such as preaching or religious gatherings and say that schools should respect the customs and religious beliefs of foreign students, but are not allowed to provide any venue for their religious activities. International students who do not live in school dormitories are required to register their address with police in the neighbourhood. Universities and colleges are now also required to have “instructors” for foreign students, following a similar practice of employing “political instructors” for Chinese students. University political instructors have long been tasked with political education and overseeing Chinese students’ ideological teaching. The Social Credit Management system, which ensures total monitoring of all those resident in China, is planned to be implemented across China by 2018.

These measures are reinforced by the National Security Education Campaign launched in August 2016 amidst accusations of “hostile foreign forces” meddling in China and fanning domestic discontent. In April 2017, Beijing announced incentives of up to US$ 72,000 for people providing information on suspected spies. On May 16, 2017, China issued its first public draft of an Intelligence Law that is expansive and allows the detention and monitoring of suspects as well as search of their premises, seizure of vehicles and devices and investigation of individuals and groups. Chinese citizens and foreigners are within the ambit of this law. There has also been a crackdown on Human Rights lawyers with almost 300 arrested till May 2017. There is also apprehension that Buddhist monks, especially Tibetan Buddhist monks, have the potential of being guided and controlled from “outside”. Consequently since March 2017 controls are being enforced on the movements of monks and they have been directed to take prior permission for their ‘teachings’.

Additionally, there is an arc of vulnerability developing around China. The Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR) remains restive despite the implementation of progressively restrictive security measures. While the ‘iron grid’ system ensures response to an incident by security forces within 3-5 minutes of the occurrence of an incident, the authorities introduced additional measures in early May 2017. The TAR public security bureau (PSB) enhanced its surveillance and rapid deployment capability across counties. The PSB budget which was US$ 1 billion in 2014 was increased by 54 per cent in 2016 over the previous year. However, the number of medical teams visiting PLA and People’s Armed Police (PAP) personnel deployed in TAR to treat them for Post Traumatic Stress disorders has increased from one to three each year. Simultaneously, Party surveillance has been expanded with efforts to recruit one Party member in each village in TAR each year. 21,000 Party cadres also fanned out to each of TAR’s over 5000 villages. Monks and monasteries continue to be specially targetted with Party cadres deployed in each monastery. Tibetans still do not accept the China-appointed Gyaltsen Norbu as the Panchen Lama, but only as a “learned monk”. There is also a divide between Hans and Tibetans with China’s provincial media often reporting fights between Han and Tibetan students. The issue of recognition of the Dalai Lama’s reincarnation is an additional complication. China’s strong reaction to the Dalai Lama’s visit to Arunachal Pradesh reflects these tensions in TAR.

There is neither any sign of tension and violence in the Xinjiang-Uygur Autonomous Region abating. The public security budget in Xinjiang too was enhanced this year by 54 per cent from the US$ 1.05 billion last year. A report issued last year by the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS) highlighted that incidents of terrorist violence by Uyghurs were spreading to other parts of the country with substantive Muslim populations. It said that some countries, like Turkey, were providing travel documents to Uyghurs to help them escape or enter Xinjiang through South East Asia and that China should not expect assistance from foreign countries. In the past few years Provincial communist cadres and delegates to the National People’s Congress (NPC) have, unusually, named Pakistan as the source of support to the Uyghurs. In May 2017, China expressed concern about the potential danger from the Rohingyas in Myanmar being trained by the Islamic State.

There are other tensions developing on China’s periphery. Since Tsai Ing-wen of the DPP took over as Taiwan’s President, tension has risen across the Taiwan Strait with Beijing insisting that she has plans to “sneakily” make a bid for independence. The telephone call between US President designate Trump and Tsai Ing-wen has aroused deep suspicion in Beijing and Chinese analysts have stating that “with the ruling DPP moving faster toward de facto independence, China is now preparing for a final solution by non-peaceful means, which is the last resort China would prefer to turn to”.

While political tensions in Hongkong have seemingly settled for now, it was not before Beijing cracked down hard on the advocates of ‘independence’. Beijing has also pre-empted any bid by Hongkong residents to interpret the Basic Law, declaring that Beijing’s would be the final word. Differences between Hongkong ‘independence’ groups and Beijing, however, remain.

When the 19th Party Congress reviews the achievements since the last Congress, it can be expected to positively evaluate the measures implemented by Xi Jinping to ensure social stability and the CCP’s primacy. Despite the pools of dissatisfaction comprising those adversely impacted, Xi Jinping has initiated substantive steps to ‘professionalise’ the PLA and cleanse the Party. As Xi Jinping begins his second term at the end of this year and advances the ‘China Dream’ and ‘One Belt, One Road’, the hardening of the Chinese state will continue. The ensuant inflexibility will mean that negotiations are unlikely to yield concessions. This will be evident as China pursues its claims in the South China Sea and in China’s relations with India and its neighbours.

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Jayadeva Ranade is a former Additional Secretary in the Cabinet Secretariat, Government of India and is President of the Centre for China Analysis and Strategy.

Deuba has previously served three times as prime minister, in 1995-1997, 2001-2002 and 2004-2005. Nepal's last monarch King Gyanendra called him incompetent and fired him in 2002 for failing to contain a Maoist insurgency and hold elections. He was later reinstated only to be sacked again in 2005.

Deuba received wide-ranging political support during the voting and his victory was almost certain. Among the parties that backed Deuba, who has long-standing democratic credentials, were CPN-Maoist Centre and Madhes-based parties. He now becomes the 40th prime minister in Nepal’s history.

According to an article by Gopal Sharma written for Reuters, Kunda Dixit, editor of the weekly Nepali Times said that Deuba’s track record did not “inspire a great deal of confidence. He comes with a lot of baggage. Every time he has been appointed or sacked as prime minister, he has left democracy in a crisis.”

Deuba is expected to form a small Cabinet tomorrow. Some Madhesi parties are likely to join the coalition.

Growth has rebounded strongly and has reached 7.5 percent (market prices) in FY2017. This is the highest growth rate since 1994, and is a result, in part, of the low growth in the previous year; one of the best monsoons in recent years; increased availability of electricity; and greater investment as the earthquake reconstruction gathered speed, according to the World Bank’s latest Nepal Development Update.

This cyclical rebound follows two challenging years where real GDP growth fell to 3.3 percent in FY2015 due to the devastating earthquake and declined even further to a 14-year low of 0.4 percent in FY2016 due to a complete disruption in cross-border trade with India.

Rice production in FY2017 is estimated to have hit a record high of 5.2 million tons, up from 4.2 million tons a year ago, says the update. About half a million households, eligible to receive housing reconstruction grants, have received the first of three tranches. Second tranche payments have started and are expected to pick up by the end of FY2017. And a series of management reforms has eliminated power cuts in several major cities across Nepal. Meanwhile, more than 100 megawatts of new hydropower capacity, delayed by the earthquakes and the trade disruptions, have come on-stream.

Transport has revived while wholesale and retail trade have normalized, according to the update. Tourism is also recovering, with arrivals reaching pre-crisis levels during the September-December 2016 tourist season. Inflation has decelerated primarily due to the normalization of imports and moderating inflation in India as a result of demonetization.

However, while imports have rebounded, exports remain slow due to sluggish India-bound exports and continued appreciation of the effective exchange rate. As a result, the trade deficit continues to increase. While remittances continue to grow, albeit at a slower pace, external sector pressures are building up.

“Government revenue and spending have performed well,” said Takuya Kamata, the World Bank’s Country Manager for Nepal. “Revenue has exceeded the six months’ target and spending, including on capital goods, has also significantly picked up compared to previous years and is on par with revenue.” Nonetheless, very ambitious expenditures envisioned in the budget have not materialized, leaving previously accumulated government deposits (10 percent of GDP) intact.

Credit grew rapidly over the past year, reaching the highest growth rate since 2012, but deposits growth slowed down. Consequently, banks are running up against prudential limits on lending. Additionally, the government’s large cash balances have had the effect of a monetary tightening at a time when banks are trying to increase their capital base to meet the increased regulatory requirements for paid-up capital.

Looking ahead, the economic growth will remain strong, but it is expected to moderate in line with country’s potential, averaging 5 percent over the next two fiscal years. Inflation will remain below the Central Bank’s target of 7.5 percent in FY2017, but will likely pick up in FY2018 as the effects of the demonetization taper off in India.

However, there are an increasing number of downside risks to this forecast with domestic risks predominating. “Nepal’s growth performance could moderate due to the fluid political environment and transitional challenges that can affect capital spending and uninterrupted service delivery; increased vulnerabilities in the financial sector; continued underperformance of exports; and a risk of a sharper slowdown in remittances,” notes the Update.

“With the increases in government spending as a result of new federal structures and earthquake reconstruction, the fiscal balance is expected to be negative in FY2018,” says Sudyumna Dahal, World Bank Economist and principal author of the Update. “Meanwhile, the current account, which had remained in surplus over the past several years, is expected to narrow and turn into a deficit as import growth is expected persist while growth of exports and remittances is expected to remain sluggish.”

As in previous years, significant underspending of the budget will continue. Post-earthquake reconstruction in sectors other than housing—e.g., cultural heritage, public schools, etc.—remains delayed; banks are running up against regulatory limits for lending and may face additional pressure if the deposit mobilization does not improve; and persistent contraction in migrant departures present a possible sharper slowdown in remittances.

Originally published in Himalayan Times, filed by RASTRIYA SAMACHAR SAMITI

Minister for Foreign Affairs Prakash Sharan Mahat and leader of the Democratic Party in the US House of Representatives and former Speaker Nancy Pelosi at a meeting in Singhaburbar in Kathmandu on May 7, 2017: Photo RSS

KATHMANDU: Minister for Foreign Affairs Prakash Sharan Mahat on Sunday informed Nancy Pelosi, who is the leader of the Democratic Party in the US House of Representatives and former Speaker, on the country’s current political situation in a meeting which took place at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Singhadurbar.

During the meeting, Minister Mahat shed light on the provisions guaranteeing inclusiveness, human rights and democracy in the Constitution of Nepal and apprised her about the local level elections, the peace process and its success, and promulgation of the new constitution and its implementation.

While expressing confidence that Nepalis living in the US would be provided support in the days ahead as well, Minister Mahat thanked American people and government for the support it has been extending to Nepal in the economic, social and broader areas.

He also extended gratitude for the US support in the post-earthquake rescue and relief as well as reconstruction operations.

On the occasion, Pelosi praised the provisions made in Nepal’s constitution regarding women’s participation and inclusion, expressing that the US could take a page out of these provision.

She assured that the US would continue to provide the support that it has been giving Nepal in the coming days as well no matter which government comes to power in Nepal.

Appreciating the management of the peace process and political transition and promulgation of the constitution from the Constituent Assembly in Nepal, the Congresswoman Pelosi wished for the success of the local level elections taking place in Nepal.

Foreign Secretary Shanker Das Bairagi, the members of both parties in the US House of Representatives as well as high-ranking officials, the US Ambassador to Nepal, Nepal’s Ambassador to the US, among other officials were also present in the meeting, according to Yek Raj Pathak, the Foreign Affairs Minister’s press coordinator.

Originally published by Carnegie India on March 17, by JAYADEVA RANADE

For both China and India, Buddhism is a useful enhancer of cultural soft power. The religion has, over the past decade, increased in importance for India as New Delhi tries to re-energize the religious tradition and integrate it into the country’s cultural strength; for China, meanwhile, Buddhism is an important means of soothing domestic discontent and staving off risks to its territorial integrity. Buddhism, which China has begun describing as an “ancient Chinese religion” and allowing its citizens freedom to practice, is especially significant for China in preserving domestic social stability and diffusing restiveness in the Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR) and Tibetan areas elsewhere in China. China is also using Buddhism to increase its influence in nearby regions by acquiring predominant access to powerful Buddhist organizations. Meanwhile India, which has been home to Buddhism since its birth, sees Buddhism as a way of strengthening its relationship with Southeast Asian nations and as a means of preserving the religious and cultural practices of the Tibetan Buddhist people who have sought refuge in India.

The Significance of the Dalai Lama

Central to these matters is the fourteenth Dalai Lama, who is recognized as the reincarnated traditional leader of Tibetan Buddhism and who remains the most prominent figure in the religious tradition today. The present Dalai Lama’s advancing age underscores the increasingly crucial and time-sensitive issue of who will identify his reincarnation. Communist China sees this as an opportunity to finally resolve the nettlesome issue of the Dalai Lama's status vis-a-vis Beijing so as to enhance its political control over Tibet. Chinese government officials have publically declared that China will appoint the next Dalai Lama, who will be born in China.

The Dalai Lama’s status in relation to China has remained unsettled for centuries, as successive Dalai Lamas have contested China’s sovereignty over Tibet. For their part, Chinese emperors historically considered Tibet a part of China. The seventh-century marriage of Chinese Princess Wencheng, niece of Emperor Taizong of the Tang dynasty, to Songtsän Gampo, who is credited with bringing Buddhism to Tibet, is portrayed by the Chinese Communist leadership as an attempt to civilize and project influence over Tibet.

Centuries later, China occupied Tibet in 1950, but the Chinese leadership has not been able to calm the situation in Tibet or win over the Tibetans and get them to accept their presence. In fact, Beijing has long feared the possibility of a secessionist movement in Tibet. As a result, Beijing is keen to have the fourteenth Dalai Lama return to China before his death as a symbolic recognition of Chinese sovereignty over Tibet. Failing that, China is intent on appointing the next Dalai Lama in an attempt to try to directly control the Tibetan religious hierarchy under his leadership. Apart from the Dalai Lama, China, incidentally, hosts the Panchen Lama—the second highest ranking figure in Tibetan Buddhism—as well as 870 rinpoches (also known as tulkus or living Buddhas).

India’s Buddhist Legacy

Like China, India has deep historical connections to Buddhism, which modern policymakers can draw on in efforts to enhance the country’s soft power. Buddhism has provided a quiet but resilient foundation to India’s centuries-old cultural links to countries in South, Southeast, and East Asia. India is the birthplace of Buddhism, [although the historical Buddha was actually born in Lumbini, Nepal] and the religion is part of India’s spiritual heritage. When India was at the height of its power, Indian priests and scholars travelled abroad and spread Buddhism widely: across Tibet and China and then on to Japan, and throughout Southeast Asia via Sri Lanka. Tibetan Buddhism in particular spread northward to Tibet and China, while the Theravada school of Buddhism was promoted in South Asia and throughout Southeast Asia.

Buddhism’s influence remains present in Indian art, culture, and architecture. The three lions of the Ashoka pillar, which independent India adopted as its national emblem, are a symbol of the impact of Buddhist thought on the country and its people. As of 2011, there are over 8 million practicing Buddhists in India.

India has ties to Tibetan Buddhism through its own sizable Tibetan community. The first major wave of Tibetans arrived in India from Tibet with the fourteenth Dalai Lama in March 1959. Following the Chinese occupation of Tibet in 1950 and the Dalai Lama’s flight to India in 1959, high-ranking Tibetan religious leaders, members of the Tibetan nobility, and ordinary Tibetans continued to flee to India, mainly via Nepal. Today, India remains home to the fourteenth Dalai Lama and the heads of all four main sects of Tibetan Buddhism, namely the Gelug, Kagyu, Nyingma, and Sakya, in addition to the many other high-ranking Tibetan lamas. The main monasteries of these four sects are all, however, located in Tibet.

Buddhism in Indian and Chinese Diplomacy

India has been promoting Buddhist thought and culture in recent years. In November 2011, with assistance from the Indian government, an organization called the Global Buddhist Congregation (GBC) helped bring representatives of a multitude of Buddhist traditions together in one overarching body. Roughly 900 patriarchs, supreme patriarchs, and high-ranking monks of various Buddhist traditions from around the world attended the GBC in New Delhi, making it one of the largest gatherings of Buddhist leaders since the time of King Asoka (268­–232 BCE). The gathered heads of the Buddhist organizations agreed that there was a need for a centralized body to interpret issues concerning Buddhism, including the preservation of the traditions and practices of various sects. As an outcome of the conference, the International Buddhist Confederation was established to further these objectives by promoting research and popularizing Buddhist practices and traditions.

A few years earlier, China had begun hosting its own international Buddhist gatherings in the mid-2000s, known as the World Buddhist Forums (WBF). The first was held in Fujian Province in 2006 and three subsequent gatherings have since been held respectively in Wuxi (in Jiangsu Province) in 2009, in Hong Kong in April 2012, and again in Wuxi in 2015. The WBF aims to convey to Buddhist populations in China and neighboring countries that the Chinese Communist authorities approve of Buddhism. A large number of Buddhist religious monks, scholars, and other figures, including some from India, have been invited to the WBFs. These periodic gatherings are reflective of China’s effort to raise the profile of the China-appointed Panchen Lama, Tibetan Buddhism’s second most influential figure, and convince Buddhists to accept him as the rightful holder of this position. Beijing has not invited the Dalai Lama to the World Buddhist Forums on the grounds that he is a “disruptive element.” The GBC hosted in India in 2011 impacted China’s efforts and the WBF in 2012 was a muted affair.

On occasion, Tibetan Buddhism has drawn attention to the ongoing border dispute between China and India. Uyghen Thinley Dorje, another prominent Tibetan Buddhist figure in exile in India, visited the Indian state of Arunachal Pradesh in November 2016; he is recognized by the Dalai Lama and Chinese authorities as the Gyalwa Karmapa (head of Tibetan Buddhism’s Kagyu sect). China is especially sensitive to Indian political figures and the Dalai Lama visiting this state, which it claims is part of China. The Dalai Lama’s planned visit to Arunachal Pradesh in April 2017 is being interpreted by Beijing as indicative of New Delhi’s willingness to assert its sovereignty despite predictable Chinese protests. In March 2017, India is hosting a Buddhist conference in Nalanda meant to advance efforts to bring together all Buddhist lamas into the fold. Hosted by the Indian Ministry of Culture, the gathering is convening prominent Buddhist monks from over thirty countries—including Bangladesh, Cambodia, Sri Lanka, and Vietnam. The Nalanda conference will likely enhance India’s standing in the Buddhist community.

Meanwhile, since Prime Minister Narendra Modi took office in 2014, the Indian government has made Buddhism an element of its bilateral diplomatic efforts, which have been particularly noticeable with Japan and Mongolia. Modi has put Buddhism on India’s diplomatic agenda with Japan. In August 2014, for instance, Modi visited two ancient Buddhist temples in Japan, and Buddhism was mentioned in the joint statement after a subsequent visit to Japan in November 2016. Private organizations have been involved in these efforts as well. In September 2015, for example, the International Buddhist Confederation, the Vivekananda International Foundation, and the Tokyo Foundation put together a joint Buddhist and Hindu three-day conclave on conflict avoidance and environment consciousness.

Buddhism also factors into India’s diplomacy with Mongolia. It is worth noting that since the Mongol ruler Altan Khan first conferred the title of Dalai Lama on the Gelug monk Sonam Gyatso in the late sixteenth century, subsequent Dalai Lamas have looked to the Mongol rulers for support. Mongolia’s unique link to the Dalai Lama lends special significance to Prime Minister Modi’s visit to Ulaanbaatar in May 2015. Modi’s visit involved numerous references to India and Mongolia’s shared Buddhist connection. Two examples were his speech to the Mongolian parliament, which mentioned the Buddha and Buddhism seven times, his visit to the Gandantegchinlen monastery.

Mongolia’s special link with the Dalai Lama has, at times, complicated the country’s relations with China. In November 2016, for instance, Mongolia welcomed the Dalai Lama despite stern Chinese warnings not to do so. The Dalai Lama pointedly utilized the four-day visit to exercise his religious authority by approving and authenticating the identity of the tenth incarnation of the third-highest ranking lama of Tibetan Buddhism, the Jebtsundamba Khutuktu, who now resides in Mongolia.

By comparison, other countries in Asia—including Myanmar, South Korea and Vietnam—that have strong links to Buddhism have not permitted a visit by the Dalai Lama. Myanmar and Vietnam, though strongly Buddhist, follow the Theravada tradition and are especially careful of Beijing’s sensitivities about the Dalai Lama. Like China, Vietnam is a Communist country, although the country’s Communist party allows its members to practice religion and many of them are Buddhist. South Korea, meanwhile, has adopted a form of Buddhism that blends elements of Mahayana with its own distinctive characteristics.

China’s Efforts to Shape Tibetan Buddhist Politics

Since the fourteenth Dalai Lama began travelling abroad around 1980 to familiarize people with the Tibet issue and lobby for the Tibetan people, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has reacted to his actions and labelled him a “separatist.” As China has grown economically and militarily stronger, its protests have grown more strident. Since 2007, China has been trying to undercut the Dalai Lama’s influence and isolate him by pressuring foreign leaders and governments not to officially receive the Dalai Lama. Failure to comply has resulted in China taking punitive economic measures that typically prompt an appreciable drop in foreign direct investment or exports for periods of at least six months to a year. This has often been accompanied by a suspension, or freezing of diplomatic contact, until an apology has been tendered. Beijing has toughened the policy in the past couple of months to include meetings with the sikyong, or prime minister, of the Tibetans in exile. The Dalai Lama issue has also, since 2007, begun figuring more prominently as a bone of contention in interactions between India and China at the official Track I and unofficial Track II levels.

There are major reasons for increased Chinese concern. Beijing believes that what it deems to be hostile foreign forces will use the Tibetans to stir up trouble inside China. Beijing wants to avoid having a situation in which there are two Dalai Lamas, like the situation that exists in the case of the Panchen Lama; Beijing feels that this would inflame internal tensions. In the case of the Panchen Lama, though, the individual recognized by the fourteenth Dalai Lama as the Panchen Lama is in Chinese custody and kept away from public gaze while China tries to persuade the Tibetans to accept Gyancain Norbu, the individual appointed by China. China persists with its efforts to persuade the fourteenth Dalai Lama to return to spend his “last days” in his “motherland.”

China has sought to bolster its claims of being a country with a strong Buddhist heritage. In 2008, Chinese archaeologists discovered a skull bone of the Buddha inside a model of a stupa made of sandalwood, gold, silver, and gemstones, which was then interred in a temple in Jiangsu Province.

China’s efforts to undermine the Dalai Lama’s influence also have included supporting Shugden worship, which he banned in 1996. Chinese authorities have supported worshippers of the Shugden deity, disbursed generous subsidies to their monasteries, and instigated Shugden groups in India and elsewhere to initiate litigation against the Dalai Lama and stage protests to harass him. The Chinese government even invited prominent Tibetan Buddhist monks known to be Shugden practitioners, or otherwise critical of the Dalai Lama, to the sixtieth anniversary celebrations of what it describes as the peaceful liberation of Tibet to embarrass the Dalai Lama.

Moreover, China has been steadily trying to acquire influence over the various Tibetan Buddhist sects and subtly get them to break ranks with the Dalai Lama. China has consistently favored the Kagyu sect, which is numerous in western Tibet; in Himachal Pradesh, Ladakh, and Sikkim in India; and in Bhutan. Journalists based in Jammu and Kashmir claim that the Chinese are also discreetly supporting the Drukpa Kagyu Rimpoche in Ladakh, who has made little secret of his differences with the Dalai Lama and has been urging supporters not to flock to the Dalai Lama when he is in Ladakh or participate in the Dalai Lama’s teachings.

Buddhism in China and India’s Neighborhood: The Case of Nepal

One neighboring country where China is using Buddhism to expand regional influence is Nepal. China’s interest in Nepal is primarily because of the nearly 20,000 Tibetans residing there. Additionally, a number of people of Tibetan origin live in the northern fringes of Nepal bordering Tibet. China has serious apprehensions that what it refers to as hostile foreign forces—an oblique reference to the United States and India—may use Nepal as a base to create disturbances inside Tibet. China has expanded its influence in Nepal, and its embassy now interacts directly with Nepal’s police to restrict the activities of Tibetans resident there. China has specific interest in Lumbini, the birth place of the Buddha, which lies in Nepal just across the border with India. As a high-ranking Chinese official once told a Nepali reporter, “We visit Nepal because you have Lumbini, the birthplace of Buddha.”

Nepal has been the site of ongoing efforts by Beijing to oversee, or at least influence, the selection of Tibetan Buddhist religious leaders. It has successfully blocked the Dalai Lama in Nepal. In fact, in 2012, Nepal’s then culture minister, Minendra Rijal, said the Dalai Lama might visit Lumbini sometime in the future after “the leadership of China will find ways to deal with His Holiness the Dalai Lama, which will be respectful of the Chinese people.” Meanwhile, the Sakya Tibetan Buddhist lineage and its sub-sects were permitted, after approval from Beijing, to become the only sect to hold Monlam celebrations in Lumbini. The Nyingmapa sect too has accepted Beijing’s contention that it alone has the authority to choose and recognize high-ranking monks and followed the procedure prescribed by Beijing to secure its approval for Penor Rimpoche’s reincarnation and enthronement in 2014. The Kagyu sect negotiated with Chinese authorities in mid-2014 when they insisted on performing the last rites of Shamar Rinpoche, the fourteenth Shamarpa and second highest spiritual figure of the Karma Kagyu Tradition of Tibetan Buddhism in Nepal. Initial approval accorded by the Nepali embassy in New Delhi was withdrawn under pressure from the Chinese embassy in Kathmandu, which objected to the presence of a representative of the Dalai Lama who was to accompany the body to Kathmandu and preparations by the Tibetan community for a rally in Kathmandu’s Bouddha area. The approval was later restored.

China’s interest in Lumbini first became public in June 2011, when a Chinese government-sponsored nongovernmental organization (NGO), the Asia Pacific Exchange and Cooperation Foundation (APECF), proposed a $3 billion plan to develop Lumbini to the Nepalese government.

The plans included hotels, an airport, and a Chinese-managed Buddhist university and seminary. Xiao Wunan, a senior CCP cadre who till his retirement late last year was a deputy director in China’s National Development and Reform Commission in western China, was executive vice president of the foundation. The appointment of Pushpa Kamal Dahal, better known as Prachanda, who is the current Nepalese prime minister, as vice chairman of the APECF, emphasized China’s interest in Nepal. While the APECF’s proposal has been kept in limbo, the Nepalese government is unwilling to reject China’s proposal. The establishment of the Greater Lumbini National Development Directive Committee under the chairmanship of Prachanda is indicative of this. To canvass support for the development of Lumbini, Chinese government-sponsored NGOs have since tried to co-opt prominent Nepal politicians and have appointed Madhav Kumar Nepal and Sujata Koirala to boards of Chinese NGOs. In 2013, the Buddhist Association of China, whose vice-president is the Beijing-selected Panchen Lama, announced plans to take over coordination of the Lumbini project. While more limited in its scope as compared to the APECF proposal, efforts have not moved beyond the planning stages.

Additionally, there are many Tibetan Buddhist monasteries strung across the entire length of the Indo-Himalayan belt that exercise almost unmatched influence on the local populations in their jurisdictions. Monasteries like Hemis in Ladakh and Tawang in Arunachal Pradesh own considerable property and large tracts of land. The latter could at some stage become a nettlesome issue in negotiations between India and China. Viewed together with China’s attempts to set up a monastery, seminary, and nunnery in Lumbini to educate and train young monks free of cost, there is a real possibility that China will use them to try and increase its influence along India’s northern borders.

There are other concerns for the Dalai Lama’s supporters and China too. Credible reports indicate rivalries within the Dalai Lama’s office have grown. Gaining quiet momentum among foreigners supporting the Dalai Lama and the Tibet cause, as well as foreign-based Tibet support groups, is the view that India-based, or Indian Tibetans, are grabbing all political power in the wider community of the Dalai Lama’s sympathizers. Implicit in this perspective is the suggestion that political authority should be shared, but it is unclear as to precisely with whom. The Chinese Communist leadership too appears to have become nervous at the rapid growth in the number of Buddhist adherents in China. Recent reports point to the authorities tightening the monitoring of the activities of Buddhist monks, especially of Tibetan Buddhist monks, and enforcing regulations restricting their activities and the places they can visit.

Buddhism is an intrinsic part of India’s spiritual heritage. India’s outreach to countries in Southeast Asia will be reinforced by Buddhism. Meanwhile, the presence of the heads of the various Tibetan Buddhist sects in India will enrich Buddhism and strengthen India’s bonds with Buddhists around the world. The demographic changes taking place in China similarly make Buddhism increasingly relevant. China’s leadership considers the return of its Tibetan Buddhist religious figures important for the country’s stability. Beijing can be expected to continue to try and enhance its soft power by claiming a strong Buddhist heritage and strengthening its outreach to Buddhist populations within and outside its borders.

Jayadeva Ranade is a former additional secretary in the Cabinet Secretariat, Government of India and is presently president of the Center for China Analysis and Strategy.

Normal life in southern districts – particularly in Saptari – came to a halt this week, due to a general strike call by the Madhesis in protest of four youths killed by armed police. The security forces opened fire on a protest group on Monday. Curfews were set in place. Schools, factories and other industries were closed.

Tensions were raised when the country’s main opposition party, UML, organized a rally prior to the local elections, scheduled to take place on May 14 – the first local elections to be held in 20 years. Thousands of armed police were deployed in advance of the rally to maintain security, but protests outside the main venue – civilians carrying black flags and blocking roads – erupted into lethal violence, when the police opened fire, wounding 12 and killing 4. Many of the wounded are listed as in critical condition.

Who gave the go-ahead for police to open fire?

According to numerous reports, Prime Minister Prachanda was shocked by the police reaction and was furious with Home Minister Bimalendra Nidhi (a Nepali Congress leader), when he learned that Nidhi had authorized the use of fire-arms. To justify his authorization, Nidhi is reported to have said he ordered the police to “only aim below the knees,” which is not only bizarre but in direct violation of international law: Firearms must never be used as a tactical tool for the management of demonstrations or other public assemblies, and are not an appropriate tool to contain widespread violence. Arbitrary or abusive use of force and firearms by law enforcement officials must be punished as a criminal offence. “These deaths are not an isolated incident,” commented Amnesty International spokesperson Aura Freeman. “In the lead-up to local elections, when further protests are likely to occur, it is imperative that security forces refrain from using excessive force once and for all.”

If, indeed, the blame falls directly on the shoulders of Nepal’s Home Minister, then Mr. Nidhi has some explaining to do.

According to the Nepali Times , “Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal’s accusation that Home Minister Bimalendra Nidhi ordered police to open fire has raised suspicion that the Saptari killings could have been a conspiracy to scuttle local polls.”

Will the local elections be held in the south as scheduled?

The Samyukta Loktrantrik Madhesi Morcha (SLMM) – an alliance of seven regional parties -- often abbreviated to Morcha – have been boycotting the elections, since their demands to change the constitution have been ignored by the government. The group has accused leaders of the UML, the country's main opposition party, of humiliating its supporters and deriding the community during the mass rally. The protesters also aver that the constitution discriminates against them by limiting their representation in state institutions. They have long called for the redrawing of provincial boundaries to ensure greater representation for their community.

In the meantime, the UN, as well as the US and British embassies, have raised serious concern over the escalation of tension in the lead-up to the elections. Interestingly, India, which normally quickly responds to every major political development in Nepal, has remained silent.

The Morcha has warned it will withdraw support to the government if its demands are not addressed in a week. Such rapid resolution within the government seems highly unlikely.

Which poses the questions: Will the local elections be held at all in the south? And if they are held, what further violence and civil unrest awaits the people of Nepal?

Excerpt from the desk of my colleague Jayadeva Ranade, President of the Centre for China Analysis and Strategy. Ranade is former additional secretary in the Cabinet Secretariat, Government of India. His article was first published yesterday by Rediff.com.

At a time when the international balance of power is still in flux and competition is underway in the Indo-Pacific, Donald Trump's election as the 45th President of the United States has added to uncertainties.

Trump's policies towards the Indo-Pacific -- and especially Japan, India and China -- have the potential to reshape developments in the region.

Discernible from Trump's campaign speeches and other remarks is that economic considerations will underpin most decisions and agreements.

Relationships will tend to be transactional in Trump's administration with a marked preference for bilateral negotiations and agreements rather than international or regional arrangements.

Unclear is the extent of influence that the military officers, who occupy a number of key positions in the Trump cabinet, will exercise on issues like China's actions in the South China Sea.

The considerable domestic opposition to Trump, however, makes it unlikely that policy changes contemplated by him can be implemented soon.

…

Within four days of his swearing in, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Trump had a telephonic conversation where Trump described India as a 'true friend and partner' and invited Modi to visit the US.

Among the issues discussed were trade, defense and terrorism and security in South Asia and Central Asia. Modi and Trump emphasized that the US and India will 'stand shoulder to shoulder in the global fight against terrorism.'

Modi is likely to meet Trump in May in what promises to be a good visit since there are few real differences. Both countries have invested a lot in the relationship over the past 20 years and it is in their mutual interest to preserve and build on it.

Trump's stated strong stance against Islamist extremism and terrorism could play into the Indo-US relationship. It could mold US attitude and exert pressure on Pakistan.

In the event of the US military presence in Afghanistan increasing, however, Pakistan could gain an opportunity to again emphasize its importance.

If the US exits Afghanistan, then China and Pakistan will play a larger role there.

Among the irritants that could surface between the US and India is the issue of H1B visas. [The H1B visa is an employment-based, non-immigrant visa category for temporary workers. For such a visa, an employer must offer a job and apply for the applicant’s H1B visa petition with the US Immigration Department.] Here, India will need to work with the US to find a solution.

China is the largest country in the region and has complicated relationships with the US and its allies.

After a rocky start following Trump's telephone conversation with Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen and his subsequent tweet, Chinese President Xi Jinping and Trump had a lengthy, 'cordial' conversation -- their first -- on February 10.

In a reference to the earlier tension, China's official news agency Xinhua specifically reported Trump as saying 'he fully understands the high significance of the US government's pursuit of the one-China policy, adding that the US government adheres to the one-China policy.

Xinhua quoted Xi as replying that 'he appreciated Trump's stressing that the US government adheres to the one-China policy, adding that the policy is the political basis of China-US relations.'

Trump's telephone conversation with Taiwan's president, however, still rankles with Beijing, which apprehends that the next few years could potentially be rough.

Among the items on Trump's agenda for China are: Reducing the trade deficit; ensuring China revalues its currency; and preventing China from exercising sovereignty over the South China Sea through which trillions of dollars of international cargo transits.

The appointment of the Harvard educated China scholar Peter Navarro to head the newly-established National Trade Council suggests that China will be at the center of the Trump administration's focus on economic issues.

A comprehensive policy for dealing with China is separately being formulated.

In the context of Trump's warning to US companies to bring manufacturing jobs back to the US from overseas and especially China, the Chinese industry minister said China would not change its plans for expansion of the Chinese economy.

Trump has also said he will increase the size of US ground forces and that of the US navy to over 350 fighting ships.

While this will appreciably increase jobs and manufacturing in the US, it simultaneously implies that the US navy will over the coming decade enhance its maritime presence especially in the Indian Ocean and South China Sea.

Interesting in this context are Trump's conversations with leaders of friendly South-East Asian countries, including Rodrigo Duterte of the Philippines, and their agreement to meet in the near future.

Beijing apprehends that the Trump administration's policies could retard its ambitions and its efforts since 2013 to alter the status quo in its neighborhood.

China's responses have been measured and deliberate and it has given indication of willingness to cooperate by stopping coal imports from North Korea from February 19, till the end of December 2017 in a bid to apply pressure on Pyongyang.

It has, however, made clear that it will not yield its claims to sovereignty over the South China Sea.

Finally, it remains unclear whether Trump's repeated references to 'America First' are centered only on the economy or also intended to convey that the US will strive to remain the unchallenged superpower.

What is clear is that the Indo-Pacific will be of great interest to the Trump administration.

Occasionally, an Indian assertion arises that Lord Buddha’s birthplace was India, not Nepal. Nepalis take it as a slap in their faces. It underlines Nepalis’ perception that India is guilty of a pervasive disregard (and ignorance) of Nepal’s proud heritage, often overlooking cold hard facts. When determining where Lord Buddha spent the first 29 years of his life, ancient chronicles and contemporary science are thoroughly on Nepal’s side.

Case in point: in 2009, Bollywood produced a comedy/martial-arts movie called “Chandni Chowk to China” in which the voice-over narrator says that Lord Buddha was born in India. After Nepal’s censor board banned the showing of the film in Nepal because of the misstatement, the Indian film producer publicly apologized for the gaffe. But there was no indication that he would edit out the offending sequence in international distribution.

According to Buddhist tradition, based on ancient chronicles, Lord Buddha, (also known as Shakyamuni, Gautama Buddha and, as a youth, Siddhartha Gautama) was born sometime between 623 BC and 563 BC, depending on one's sources.

Ancient Buddhist literature, including the famous travel documents of a 4th century Chinese monk named Fa-hsien, indicate the Lord Buddha’s birthplace was located in present-day Lumbini. A seventh century Chinese monk travelled to Nepal and identified the location of the Buddha’s birthplace by citing the famous capital city of the ancient kingdom of Kapilavatsu as being approximately 30 kilometers from Lumbini. In modern reckoning, that capital is 28 kilometers from Lumbini.

In the interim, sequential digs and analyses of artifacts unearthed in Lumbini, support the traditional belief that Lord Buddha was born in Lumbini.

But it was not until 2013 that an excavation team, sponsored by UNESCO, using modern technology, produced positive evidence that Lumbini dated back to at least the sixth century BC, thus matching the site to the time of the historical Buddha’s life. It made international headlines because, in the third century BC, Ashoka, the Indian emperor remodeled the site, inadvertently destroying earlier remains. Durable brick architecture supplanted non-durable timber.

The UNESCO team (funded by the Government of Japan) sought to overcome these limitations by providing direct archaeological evidence of the nature of a pre-Ashoka Buddhist shrine and thus securing a viable chronology. Indeed, the excavations revealed a sequence of earlier structures preceding the major rebuilding by Asoka during the third century BC.

"This is one of those rare occasions when belief, tradition, archaeology and science actually come together," Professor Robin Coningham of Durham University in UK and co-director of the archeological team working in Lumbini, said at the time. "We know the entirety of the shrine sequence started in the sixth century B.C., and this sheds light on a very long debate."

WHAT TECHNOLOGY WAS USED TO SECURE THE DATING?

Kosh Prasad Acharya (former Director General of Nepal’s Department of Archaeology, and currently Executive Director of the Pashupati Area Development Trust) told me in an INTERVIEW that the team had tested fragments of charcoal and grains of sand from the site, using a combination of radiocarbon and optically stimulated luminescence (OSL) techniques.

Some of this analyzed sediment confirmed the presence of ancient tree roots within the main temple shrine in Lumbini. From a Buddhist point of view, evidence of a shrine revering a tree is extremely significant: According to Buddhist tradition, Queen Maya Devi, mother of Lord Buddha, gave birth to him while holding on to the branch of a Bodhi or fig tree (Ficus religiosa) at the Lumbini gardens, midway between the kingdoms of her husband (Kapilvastu) and her parents' kingdom (Nawalparasi). See map below.

“With the help of these findings, many other historical facts can come out,” said Acharya. “And I do want to clear the misconception of a few who think Buddha was born in India, as such discoveries at Lumbini will make it easier for them to accept the reality.”

Coningham also said that even older remains of a village dating back to as early as 1300 BC were found a few hundred meters south of Lord Buddha’s birthplace, pushing back the date of the settlement of the region a thousand years. Thus, Lumbini’s history extends far before the visit of Emperor Ashoka.

HOW DID THE NEPAL VS. INDIA CONTROVERSY BEGIN?

In 1898, a buried stupa was discovered in India by William Claxton Peppe, a British colonial engineer and landowner, who owned an estate where the discovery was made. The name of the place was Piprahawa, south of the Nepal border.

Peppe led a team in excavating a large earthen mound on his land. Having cleared away scrub and jungle, they set to work building a deep trench through the mound.

Eventually they came to a large stone coffer which contained five small vases containing bone fragments, ashes and jewels. On one of the vases was a Brahmi inscription which was translated to mean "This relic-shrine of divine Buddha (is the donation) of the Shakya-Sukiti brothers, associated with their sisters, sons, and wives", implying that the bone fragments were part of the remains of Gautama Buddha.

This led some scholars to suggest that modern-day Piprahawa was the site of the ancient city of Kapilvastu, the capital of the Shakya kingdom, where Siddhartha Gautama – later referred to as Shakyamuni – spent the first 29 years of his life. The king of Kapilvastu was Lord Buddha’s father, Śuddhodana. Other scholars, however, challenged the opinion and proposed that it referred to the Buddha’s kinsman rather than the Buddha himself.

Almost a century later, from 1971-1973, a team of the Archaeological Survey of India led by K.M. Srivastava resumed excavations at the Piprahawa stupa site. The Indian team discovered a casket containing fragments of charred bone at a location several feet deeper than the coffer that W.C. Peppe had previously excavated. As the relic containers were found in the deposits from the period of Northern Black Polished Ware, Srivastava dated the find to the fifth-fourth centuries BCE, which would be, more or less, consistent with the period in which the Buddha is believed to have lived.

The news was a sensation in India. More than ten million people reportedly paid homage to the relics when they were first exhibited in Sri Lanka in 1978.

But the vast majority of scholars found Srivastava’s claim dubious, noting the challenges that isolated finds present to paleographical study. One of the foremost epigraphists and authorities on Central Asian and South Asian archaeology, Ahmad Hasan Dani, observed in 1997 that "The Piprahawa vase… has an inscription scratched on the steatite stone in a careless manner. The style of writing is very poor, and there is nothing in it that speaks of the hand of the Asokan scribes". He concluded that "the inscription may be confidently dated to the earlier half of the second century B.C."

SO WHERE DID PRINCE SIDDHARTHA SPEND THE FIRST 29 YEARS OF HIS LIFE?

Most scholars now agree that the future Lord Buddha spent his childhood, youth and early adulthood in Tilaurakot, Nepal, 28 kilometers west of Lumbini.

The evidence that Tilaurakot was the capital of Kapilvastu is overwhelming.

First, one must take into account the sheer size of the ancient Shakya kingdom of Kapilvastu, ruled by Prince Siddhartha’s father, King Śuddhodana.

The ancient chronicles describe the Kingdom of Kapilvastu as extending, from east to west, between two famous rivers, Rohini and Rapti. From north to south, it touched the Himalayas and approached Kushinagar and Pava in present-day India. In other words, the Kingdom of Kapilavatsu extended down into the Indian plains, including the hamlet of Piprahawa.

Piprahawa was not the capital of Kapilvastu. The ruins there are of an ancient monastery, a vihara complex of considerable significance amidst the Indian jungle, in all probability under the purveyance of the King of Kapilvastu.

The Jataka Stories mention numerous associations of laborers employed by the Shakya kings in their palace and in their country, including coin smiths, weaponry smiths, stoneworkers, ivory workers and jewelers. Why is this relevant? During Nepalese and Japanese joint archaeological excavation at Tilaurakot (1967-77) a large hoard of coins, weapons, ivory objects and jewelry were uncovered from the Kapilvastu site.

The previously mentioned Chinese monk Fa-hsien visited Kapilvastu in the fourth century AD and provided a detailed account of how to get there, which matches modern-day locations.

EVIDENCE PROVIDED BY ANCIENT ROADS

In the vicinity of the Tilaurakot’s fortified area, Mishra unearthed ancient roads dating as far back as 7th – 6th century BC. The roads were very wide and paved with bricks and brickbats. Some roads have stone edging on both sides. Very interestingly, some roads have eight inches soling – under layers – made from iron slag. Such an improved road transport in the vicinity indicates that Tilaurakot was a very important hub indeed.

EVIDENCE PROVIDED BY LOCATION OF RIVER

Based on the early Buddhist sources, the capital of Kapilvastu was near the Banganga River. From Tilaurakot, one can see the Banganga River in the distance. It supplied the water for Tilaurakot’s moats. There are no rivers in the vicinity of Piprahawa.

EVIDENCE PROVIDED BY ARCHEOLOGICAL EXCAVATIONS

Well over a century of archeological digs conducted in Tilaurakot fulfill all the conditions described by ancient texts. Renowned archeologists include Dr. A. Fuhrer (1897), P. C. Mukherji (1899), Debala Mitra (1962), Tarananda Mishra (1967-72), Babu Krishna Rijal (1972-73) and a joint team from Rissho University of Japan DoA, Nepal (1967-77). More current digs also have been conducted wherein the vestiges of the fortification walls, moats, palaces, stupas, temples, viharas, (monasteries), ponds and guardrooms have been revealed further solidifying Tilaurakot as the home of a great king.

In the spring of 2016, Robin Coningham, the chief archaeologist, announced the findings of his three-year excavation project in Tilaurakot. He said the ancient infrastructure he unearthed could be at least 2,800 years old.

Coningham’s team was comprised of 10 professors from Stirling University and Durham University of the United Kingdom, two UNESCO consultants, five experts from Nepal’s Department of Archeology, four people from the Lumbini Development Trust, and a handful of students.

What they found was astounding: the remnants of houses, roads, walls surrounding the palace grounds, extended palace infrastructure, guardhouses, and the east and west entry gates into the widespread grounds.

More digging will resume in January 2017.

For Buddhists, the Eastern Gate of Tilaurakot is of particular significance. This is the gate from where Prince Siddhartha, at the age of twenty-nine, rode away in a chariot pulled by his favorite horse, Kanthaka. By his side was Chhanna, his charioteer.

After crossing the Anoma River, Siddhartha shaved his head and formally entered the world of monkshood, leaving the world of luxury forever. From here on out, he would walk. He sent Chhanna and Kanthaka back home.

According to Buddhist tradition, Kanthaka had a sole purpose to accomplish: to usher the future Buddha into the real world of human suffering. Just before Kanthaka and Chhanna arrived back at the eastern gate of Tilaurakot, the horse died of exhaustion. A stupa was built in his honor and you can still make out the mound from the eastern gate.

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There is a great deal more evidence to be found at the Lumbini Development Trust’s website:

Since 1990, when Nepal adopted a multi-party democracy, there have been 24 prime ministers – basically a new prime minister annually for the last two-and-a-half decades. It’s hardly a recipe for a stable government, let alone a nascent democracy.

The shift has been a violent one. In 1996, a communist insurgency was launched by a little known Maoist group led by Pushpa Kamal Dahal aka Prachanda, (his nom de guerre). Prachanda rapidly amassed an army of armed rebels, who fought the government’s security and military forces for the next ten years. More than 15,000 Nepalis died. The government put a “wanted dead or alive” $64,000 bounty on Prachanda’s head. By 2005, it became obvious that Prachanda’s “People’s Liberation Army” would never defeat Nepal’s army. So he joined hands with the country’s bourgeois parties to bring down the enormously unpopular King Gyanendra.

In April 2006, a country-wide uprising called the “19-Day Revolution” forced the king to step down, clearing the way for Prachanda and his Maoist party to enter into the legitimate political arena. In 2008, national elections were held and to the surprise of almost everyone the Maoists won the elections. Prachanda became the first prime minister of the newly named Democratic Federal Republic of Nepal.

Prachanda’s tenure lasted but nine months. He resigned on 4 May 2009 after he failed in his attempt to sack the army chief, General Rookmangud Katawal.

In the interim, six prime ministers have come and gone. In August of this year, Prachanda was once again elected prime minister. This time, the challenges of ruling Nepal were, perhaps even more daunting than during his first tenure: He inherited the task of rebuilding a Nepal that had been ravaged by the horrendous earthquake of 2015.

Five days ago, 12 November 2016, I had the opportunity to be the first American journalist to interview Prime Minister Prachanda since he came to office. It was at his Kathmandu residence, Baluwatar.

.....

DUNHAM: Thank you for fitting me into your busy schedule, Mr. Prime Minister. For the last four days, Americans have been preoccupied by one thing and one thing only: the U.S. election resulting in the victory for President-Elect Donald Trump. I have to admit that Trump’s success came as a complete surprise to me, as it did to most Americans, including Republicans. The divisive tone of the long campaign, the anger and the aftermath has forced Americans to re-think what their country represents. All bets are off as to what will happen next. But the dramatic shift in government is going to have an impact on the entire world. How would you characterize Nepalis’ reaction to Trump’s victory?

PRACHANDA: Thank you very much. It is not only surprising for all the media and intellectuals of America, but people all over the world are surprised by the results of the American election. As the prime minister, I have already congratulated Donald Trump. As a curtesy. It is my duty. Anyway, as you say, the result of the American election is not only concerning for Americans, but also all over the world.

It clearly indicates some sort of new trend going on in the world. The traditional democratic status quo is going to be – according to my analysis – it is going to become a narrower, more nationalistic reality. Something like that. It is going to be along the lines of a more conservative era. In that sense, it is neither a positive nor an encouraging development. That is my observation.

DUNHAM: First, we witnessed Brexit, and now this, and in France, Marine Le Pen, leader of the far-right National Front party sees Trump’s victory as a sign of new hope for her party. Likewise, the far right Netherlands leader Geert Wilders sees Trumps’ victory as an omen for his personal success – not to mention the undercurrent of Neo-Nazism in Germany and a far right movement in Italy. It does appear this pattern is making headway throughout the Western world.

PRACHANDA: Exactly. And I am saying that the pattern is emerging not only in America and Europe, but everywhere, including in South Asia.

DUNHAM: South Asia?

PRACHANDA: Yes. The pattern in India, Bangladesh, Pakistan, everywhere, we can see that this kind of trend is developing, which indicates a narrow nationalistic conservative movement that is gaining momentum.

DUNHAM: Your country suffered a tumultuous earthquake in April 2015. I was here at the time and saw the devastation firsthand. Many Americans were deeply moved by the catastrophe. They really cared. And even if they didn’t know much about Nepal – home of Mt. Everest, end of story – they did empathize with the strife and damage they saw on TV and donated money to help rebuild your country. But a big question for donors is: Why has it taken so long for the Nepal Reconstruction Authority (NRA) to distribute relief aid? What is behind the delay? And now that you are back in power, how can you facilitate the process, get it moving forward?

PRACHANDA: This is a very sensitive issue, you know. First of all, I want to convey our heartfelt greetings to all those who supported us in that devastating earthquake. Not only this or that country, but all over the world – they have supported us in our relief and rescue operations and even in the reconstruction process.

But unfortunately, here in Nepal, we could not manage to accelerate the process of reconstruction. According to my observation, the major problem we are facing is the political transition, you know. We are in an historic period of transition. Just last year, we declared the new constitution through the Constitutional Assembly and we are facing the problem of implementing that constitution. And the political stability has not been achieved fully and completely. Therefore, the political situation was made more difficult by the earthquake.

Immediately upon assuming the role of Prime Minister, I tried to focus my attention on the reconstruction process. And I gave a deadline that, within 45 days, the first round of support should be disbursed into the hands of the people, the victims of the earthquake. My observation is that the indications are now positive. I think that things will soon change in a positive direction.

DUNHAM: So you think that the international community will see progress by the beginning of next year, January 2017? Will we see substantial distribution of funds and aid?

PRACHANDA: I think so.

DUNHAM: Also, there were a lot of countries that pledged money but – as of yet – have not followed through with handing over their pledged donations. That’s very disappointing.

PRACHANDA: Yes. We are in continuous discussion with those countries that pledged help but have not yet delivered. We may make some changes in our regulations, norms and values for the reconstruction. I’m in the discussion and I am very much hopeful that, within this interaction, we will be able to create a more positive and enthusiastic atmosphere for donors.

DUNHAM: Let’s talk about the new constitution. This morning, I read that on November 15 you plan to table the amendment, which has been holding up a full-fledged implementation of the constitution and really needs to be done in order to move forward with the democratic process. In terms of time restraints, you only have fifteen months to get all of this accomplished.

PRACHANDA: Yes. Yes.

DUNHAM: It’s a tremendously complicated situation that Americans don’t understand. There are almost 300 laws that have to be passed before the implementation can be completed. You have to delineate the local and state boundaries. You have to hold elections. You have to appease the Madhesi political parties, which is another big hurdle. How realistic is the fifteen-month time-table? What are the main challenges you face in order to get all of this accomplished?

PRACHANDA: Yes, the situation is more complicated than people might think. It’s not so easy to accomplish these three rounds of elections within fifteen months. There are many challenges. But I believe that we can organize the election and accomplish the implementation of the constitution within the fifteen-to-sixteen-month timeframe. Later today, I am going to have a final discussion with the parties in power and even with the opposition party and other small parties, and I intend to finalize the draft of the amendment of the constitution. Whether or not there will be an agreement, I’m going to register the resolution for the amendment. And through this process, I believe the Madhesi, Tharu and other peoples who are demanding the amendment of the constitution will support our efforts, although they may not agree completely, although there may be some reservations and notes of dissent. And ultimately, the amendment will pass through parliament, at which time I will declare the local elections first.

DUNHAM: Let me ask a cynical question: Do you think that parliament is really motivated to pass this as soon as possible? New elections may result in them losing their seats in parliament.

PRACHANDA: I think they are motivated. But, even if parliament cannot pass the amendment by a two-thirds majority, Madhesis and Tharus and janajati will participate in the election. That has already been agreed upon. Therefore, I am very much hopeful that I will be able to organize the election of the local bodies, to be held in March or April of 2017. And I’m planning to have the provincial and national elections held at the same time. It is not impossible. It can be achieved. It can be organized.

DUNHAM: You are optimistic.

PRACHANDA: Yes, we’ll have only two rounds of elections – first the local elections and next the provincial and national elections – and there is sufficient time. No problem. And as you asked earlier about the election-related bills, some of them have already been passed and others are in the parliamentary process. Therefore, there will not be a law-related problem.

DUNHAM: As you may know, I started coming to Nepal in the late 1980s –

PRACHANDA: Yes, and thank you very much for your positive concern about the whole political, economic and cultural aspects of Nepal. I want to thank you for your concern.

DUNHAM: It’s been continually fascinating to watch the changes in Nepal. In 1990-91, for instance, I witnessed the big shift from the panchayat system to the multi-party democracy. Then the aches and pains of implementing a democracy, followed by the Maoist insurgency, the resultant power-grab of the government by the then-King Gyanendra, followed by the Janaandolan II of 2006 [the “19-Day popular uprising], followed by the ousting of the king, the declaration of a republic in 2008, and now the promulgation of a new constitution.

I think most Americans have the idea that, if you want to establish a democracy, it’s more or less a matter of flipping a few switches. As I’ve witnessed in Nepal, it takes a lot of hard work and it takes many years for a new democracy to run smoothly. And the obstacles are not just always internal ones. Throughout this process, Nepal also has had to contend with the needs and wishes of its powerful neighbors, China and India.

Take India, for example. Of particular interest is the build-up of Indian security forces along the southern Nepali border. Would you say their build-up is justifiable?

PRACHANDA: The question you have raised is a very sensitive and delicate issue one. First of all, I agree with you that there are so many ups and downs and twists and turns in the last two decades that Nepal has passed through. It is also something very unique. We had an insurgency for ten years that took thousands and thousands of lives. And that created a tremendous historical political change in Nepal – from autocratic monarchy to a federal democratic republic, in political terms.

Sometimes I say that it is a miracle. As the leader of the insurgency, I took part in the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA). I signed the agreement. And I participated in the competitive democratic election. I became the leader of the single largest party. And I became the first prime minister of the Federal Democratic Republic of Nepal in 2008. This was surprising, you know. This was something very unique and just like a miracle.

In my first term as prime minister, I had very little experience about this multi-party democratic competition and all the dynamics of this democratic system. According to my judgement, it took me nearly one decade to understand the dynamics. Now, I’m fully confident that I can move ahead and understand the dynamics of the system.

At the same time, (as you raised the issue of Nepal’s relationship with India and their presence along the border area), we have a very unique geopolitical situation, which you understand very well. We are in between India and China, two giants. And we are landlocked. Not exactly landlocked, but India-locked from the east, south and west. Because of that, we must have a good understanding and working relationship with India. Without it, it very difficult to safeguard our independence and move forward to economic prosperity.

At the same time, we should have to work on new options and alternatives for Nepal. If we are solely reliant and dependent on India, it will not help us, ultimately. We are trying to create a conducive atmosphere to have some new alternatives with China and other parts of the world. There should be some trade, transit, whatever possible with countries other than India.

DUNHAM: Last year, Nepal signed an agreement with China to buy a significant amount of petroleum. Has that agreement been completed?

PRACHANDA: The agreement has not been completed. We are trying to develop the protocol of that agreement. The process is moving forward. I am for moving forward and completing that agreement.

At the same time, we are trying to have a good understanding with India. Without having a good diplomatic understanding with India, it is very difficult to balance all these things. Previously, when I was in the insurgency, I was leading the “People’s War”. At that time, India deployed their SSB [border security force] along the border area. Now that we entered into peace process, we have witnessed a huge democratic transformation. But unfortunately, the Indian deployment along the border has not been withdrawn.

DUNHAM: Has the Indian deployment increased?

PRACHANDA: Not exactly increased. It is as it is. But we want to have a good understanding with India and through different channels, we are in interactions. I am very hopeful that, ultimately, we will have some sort of new agreement about the border issues and problems. These will be solved by mutual understanding. Recently, for instance, I visited Delhi and had a very good interaction with the leadership of India. I am very much hopeful.

During that same trip, I visited Goa for the BRICs and BIMSTEC summits. [In economics, BRIC refers to Brazil, Russia, India and China, which are all deemed to be at a similar stage of newly advanced economic development. BIMSTEC is the acronym for The Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation, an international organization comprised of

Bangladesh, India, Myanmar, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Bhutan and Nepal]. I experienced a very positive and fruitful discussion in Goa.

But to answer your question: I am hopeful that within a short span of time, we will be able to create a more positive and trustworthy atmosphere along the Indian border area.

DUNHAM: In terms of international relations, I don’t think India helped its image, when it imposed a strangling embargo on Nepal right after the 2015 earthquake. I experienced that firsthand. I was working as a consultant for an American NGO called Operation USA, based in Los Angeles, which is building a school in Fyakse –

PRACHANDA: Where is that?

DUNHAM: Fyakse is in Dhading District. The school is almost finished. Operation USA –unlike many NGOs helping in the reconstruction of Nepal after the earthquake – had no problem pursuing a project that was away from the Kathmandu Valley. This was important to me because I wanted to select an isolated area otherwise overlooked. I was here trying to facilitate the construction of the school at the time of the embargo and saw – up close and personal – the additional hardship this put on the Nepali people: On top of all their other problems, now they faced the cutting off of petroleum imports, which created a multitude of problems including getting materials to sites that were undergoing reconstruction. My point is that there have been many instances in which the Indians have been very heavy-handed when dealing with Nepalis. They certainly haven’t won the hearts of most Nepali people.

But some of their concerns with Nepal are, I think, understandable. They are concerned about Pakistani terrorists coming through Nepal in order to enter India illegally from the north. Also, there are indications that, from time to time, suspected Pakistani terrorists have been spotted in Nepal. Do you think the Indian government needs to be concerned about the possibility of Pakistani “bad players” – of using Nepal as their transit country?

PRACHANDA: I think that in the whole of South Asia, the relationship between India and Pakistan is very sensitive. And it has implications throughout South Asia. Always, we are very much concerned about it. We want to create the atmosphere of trust and confidence between all the nations here in South Asia. I think that India may have some serious and genuine concerns over their security issues. We have always tried to address that genuine concern. But Nepal can’t be blamed. Always it is asserted that terrorists are coming from Pakistan and through Nepal. We cannot say like that. We are also having good relations with Pakistan. This is their job and we do not want to be engaged in that issue.

I will say this: We do not want to let our soil used by any terrorists, whether they be from Pakistan or from any other country that might be against either India or China. We want to create a positive atmosphere to address that genuine concern of India and China. Do you understand?

DUNHAM: Yes, I do understand. And in terms of the northern border of Nepal, you have beefed up security up there. To prevent people from crossing out of Tibet into Nepal. You are having to play two games at the same time. The one in the south and the one in the north. You’re trying to maintain a peaceful relationship between India and China.

PRACHANDA: Exactly. That has been dictated by our history and geography.

DUNHAM: You can’t redraw the map.

PRACHANDA: Exactly. You understand this very well.

DUNHAM: One last question. Do you have upcoming plans to visit China as Nepal’s Prime Minister?

PRACHANDA: I’m in discussion with China’s leadership about that. But first I want to invite and welcome the President of China here, in Nepal. The last time that I had the opportunity to discuss this with him, I invited him, not only in the diplomatic and delegation setting, but also during our one-to-one conversation. He said that it was possible that he might come as early as January or February of next year. And I am always ready to visit China.

DUNHAM: Thank you very much for taking time out to meet with me, Mr. Prime Minister.

PRACHANDA: Thank you very much for your positive concern for the overall development of Nepal. And you love Nepalese people. For a long time. This is great.

The following is an excerpt from my colleague Jayadeva Ranada’s recent analysis on Wu Yingjie, China’s new Tibet Party Secretary. Ranada is former Additional Secretary in the Cabinet Secretariat, Government of India, and current President of the Centre for China Analysis and Strategy.

Weeks after the annual conclave of senior leaders of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) at the Beidaihe seaside resort, China’s official news agency Xinhua on August 28, 2016, announced the appointments of six new Party Secretaries. Priority appears to have been given to the Autonomous Regions with three of them getting new leaders. Of interest to India are the appointments of Wu Yingjie as the new Party Secretary for the Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR), Chen Quanguo as the Party Secretary of the Xinjiang-Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR) and 62-year old Chen Hao as the Party Secretary of Yunnan.

Other appointments include those of 59-year old Li Jiheng as Party Secretary of Inner Mongolia, 1955-born Du Jiahao as the Party Secretary of Hunan, 1958-born Li Jinbin as Party Secretary of Anhui and Li Xiaopeng, son of former Chinese Premier Li Peng (from 1987 to 1998) at the time of the army crackdown in Tiananmen in 1989, as China’s new Transport Minister.

Of specific interest is the new TAR Party Secretary Wu Yingjie. It would be difficult for the CCP to find another ethnic Han cadre who is as ‘Tibetan’ as Wu Yingjie. The last Han cadre fluent in Tibetan and who was regarded as a ‘Tibetan’ was former PLA General Yin Fatang, who served as Party Secretary of TAR from 1980-1985.

Till his elevation Wu Yingjie was one of four TAR Deputy Party Secretaries, with the others being Padma Choling (Tib), Lobsang Gyaltsen (Tib) and Deng Xiaogang (Han). While Padma Choling and Lobsang Gyaltsen were ranked higher, Wu Yingje was designated the Executive Deputy Secretary. Indication that Wu Yingjie was earmarked for promotion was his being sent to attend the Central Party School in Beijing from March 2000 to January 2001. He studied in the CCP Central Party School's Research Institute, focussing on Party history.

Wu Yingjie has an impeccable ‘Red’ pedigree. His father, Wu Ziming was a member of the Party committee and Secretary of the Communist Youth League of Changyi County Shandong Province. Wu Ziming was transferred to Tibet from Shandong’s Changyi county in 1956 before Wu Yingjie’s birth and assigned work in Golmud. All his family members along with Wu Yingjie came to settle with him in Golmud in 1958.

Born in Changyi County in Shandong Province in December 1956, Wu Yingjie graduated from a high school in Shandong in 1974. He first came to TAR as an “educated youth” under the Tibet Aid programme and worked in Nyingchi. In October 1977, Wu Yingjie came to live in Lhasa and became a worker at a power plant in the western part of the region. He stayed on in Tibet for the next over 40 years and joined the CCP in May 1978. Three years after the Chinese government resumed the all-China college entrance exam, Wu Yingjie enrolled in the Chinese Language and Literature Department of the Tibet Nationalities Institute, Xianyang in Shaanxi in 1979.

After graduating from University in August 1983, he was assigned the post of clerk in the Board of Education of the TAR. In 1986, Wu Yingjie was promoted to Senior Staff and in April 1987 was appointed the Deputy Director of the Primary and Secondary Education Department of the Tibet Autonomous Region Science and Technology Education Commission. Through the 1990s, he held the posts of Deputy Director as well as Director of the Assistance Office and was later promoted as Deputy Director of the Board of Education in the Tibet Autonomous Region Board of Education. By the time he reached 43 years of age in May 2000, Wu Yingjie was appointed the Director of the Tibet Education Department. Credible reports state that during his tenure in the TAR Board of Education, Wu Yingjie “worked hard to promote the development of education in Tibet” and made “important contributions” to the Tibetan schools.

In January 2003, Wu Yingjie, was promoted to the level of a Deputy Provincial cadre and appointed Vice Chairman of the TAR Government. Since then Wu Yingjie served in the TAR Party Committee as Director of the TAR Party Propaganda Department and later as Deputy Chairman of the TAR Government. In November 2011, Wu Yingjie was appointed Deputy Party Secretary of the Autonomous Region, Deputy Chairman of the Autonomous Region Government Executive and Deputy Secretary of the leading group of the Party. In April 2013, he succeeded Hao Peng as Governor of Qinghai Province and was concurrently Deputy Chairman of the Autonomous Region Government’s Executive.

As Director of the TAR Propaganda Department, Wu Yingjie received special credit for the propaganda work during the TAR’s 40th anniversary celebrations in 2005. The Region’s propaganda work was praised as “smooth and fast”. At the time of the March riots in Lhasa in 2008, he would have worked closely with Liu Yunshun, then Director of the CCP CC’s Propaganda Department, in shaping a decisive role for the CCP’s propaganda apparatus which for the first time introduced a schism between the Han majority and Tibetans. Liu Yunshun is currently a Member of the PBSC. Official Chinese media reports state that “a resounding success of patriotism education was seen” during Wu Yingjie’s tenure as Director of the TAR’s Propaganda Department.

Some interesting remarks have been made by Wu Yingjie in the past. When meeting a group of seven South Asian journalists including four from India being hosted by China’s State Council Information Office on a tour to showcase developments in Tibet, TAR Deputy Secretary Wu Yingjie disclosed to the journalists in Lhasa on August 25, 2014, that talks were on with the Dalai Lama. He clarified that these were being held through “personal envoys” and limited to discussing the possibility of his return to Tibet. He said, “All Tibetans, including the Dalai Lama and the people around him, can return if they accept Tibet and Taiwan as part of China, and give up ‘splittist’ efforts.”

Earlier in October 2009, he told US diplomats travelling in Tibet that the Dalai Lama and his "clique" masterminded the "March 14" incident as part of a bid to take back feudal power in Tibet. He claimed that during the 11th Five-Year Plan the TAR had invested a lot of money in restoring religious sites and protecting Tibetan culture and the many people praying at temples in Lhasa testify to the government's protection of religious freedom. He added that tax exemptions for farmers and herders, free medical care, subsidized housing, education and vocational training, and investments in protection of traditional Tibetan culture had improved the lives of ethnic Tibetans. Wu Yingjie also said “Nearly all rural Tibetans can read, however, one-quarter of Tibetans still live without electric power”. He asserted that “Tibetans are not economically marginalized and discrimination based on ethnic background is illegal”.

Also in October 2009, Wu Yingjie asserted that “the "Dalai" uses his religious role for political purposes and that the "March 14th Incident" was masterminded by the Dalai in order to destroy the Beijing Olympics. The Dalai just doesn't want to lose his power”. He added that “In the old days, five percent of the people controlled 95 percent of the land. The Dalai wants to restore his feudal rule, but the serfs have already been liberated. America freed all the black slaves and people welcomed that, but China freed all the Tibetan slaves under the "Dalai Clique," and some people are not happy”. Wu Yingjie added "I don't know why." He said “some foreign countries also give money to the Dalai and send high-level delegations to Dharamsala. For example, U.S. Speaker of the House Pelosi and a White House senior staff member special emissary both went to Dharamsala to see the Dalai Lama”.

He said “The Dalai is asking China to withdraw its People's Liberation Army (PLA), and other non-Tibetan people from the region, and is trying to create a so-called "Greater Tibet" that would include ethnic Tibetan areas of Sichuan, Qinghai, Yunnan and Gansu. No sovereign state could accept such demands, which would divide the country”.

Wu Yingjie additionally disclosed that “After the March 14th (2008) incident, 950 people were arrested and 80 of them were sentenced… Two hundred monks from outside of the TAR who were in the TAR without legal documents were sent back to their home areas, but no monks or nuns are missing. The government views the monasteries as public units (gonggong danwei). Therefore, the government provides the monasteries with free medical care, drinking water, and electricity, and also builds and maintains roads to the monasteries”. He also said that “During the 11th Five Year Plan the TAR has invested considerable money in the protection of Tibetan culture. For example, the government invested 380 million RMB in repairs of the Potala Palace, and the Sakya, Norbulinka, and Tashi Lhunpo Monasteries”. He said the government had built many hospitals of traditional Tibetan medicine and protected about 100 kinds of Tibetan customs as part of the PRC's "national intangible cultural heritage."

Wu Yingjie explained that “The TAR government has undertaken a series of policies to benefit Tibetans. Tibetan language education is well developed in the TAR. Rural children receive free compulsory education. The TAR offers free tuition, free food, and free accommodation for students who need to reside at school. The TAR covers up to 1300 RMB (US$ 190) in annual expenses for primary school students and 1400 RMB (US$ 206) for middle school students. Many rural schools teach classes in both Tibetan and Chinese. Some rural schools even teach English. With support from the Ministry of Information Industry, new technology has been developed to make the Tibetan language easier to use on computers”. Wu Yingjie also said “the TAR would like to teach courses in the natural sciences in the Tibetan language at the university level”. He added “before "liberation" only five percent of Tibetan people went to go to school; now, 80 percent of them are getting an education”. He said “over 98 percent of rural youth and middle aged people are literate -- that is, they are able to read the Tibetan language edition of the Tibet Daily. The government also sends many Tibetan students to inland China to study for free. Generous stipends are provided to students from the TAR who are accepted into a university in inland China”.

In response to a question by the US Consul General at Chengdu about the economic marginalization of ethnic Tibetans in the TAR and a sign on a Lhasa shop that only an ethnic Han would be hired for a particular job, Wu Yingjie declared that “Tibetans are not economically marginalized” and "I don't know why people say such things." Stating that it is impossible to develop such a rapidly growing economy without the participation of ethnic Tibetans, he pointed out that in TAR, 70 percent of the civil servants are ethnic minorities and only 30 percent are ethnic Han.

Wu Yingjie is reputed to get along well with colleagues and be good at delegating work. He is 1.83 metres, or just over six feet, tall and a good athlete who has played basketball and volleyball.

Wu Yingjie’s appointment suggests an effort by Beijing to adopt a more sensitive and understanding approach towards Tibetans. While his predecessor Chen Quanguo focussed more on tightening security and enhancing the Party’s presence and surveillance throughout Tibet, Wu Yingjie is likely to give more importance to the TAR’s propaganda effort. He can be expected to retain the focus on education.

The appointments also indicate that decisions have been taken to fill the anticipated more than 90 vacancies in the CCP Central Committee at the 19th Party Congress. There will also be 5 clear vacancies in the PBSC and 6 among the 18 full members of the Politburo. Xi Jinping will try to fill as many of these as possible with loyalists.

Today, former communist rebel leader Pushpa Kamal Dahal aka “Prachanda” officially became Nepal’s new Prime Minister, which makes him the 24th prime minister in the last 26 years, one of the key reasons contributing to Nepal’s ongoing instability.

It was a foregone conclusion, since Dahal was the only candidate. This is Dahal’s second time as prime minister.

Analysts dismiss the idea that the regime change indicates any agreement within parties as to how the nation should move forward. Rather, it is regarded as a move of convenience – stalling for time. A deal is already in place to change the prime minister nine months from now.

Nepali Congress leader Sher Bahadur Deuba is expected to take over from Prachanda before Nepal holds a general election at the beginning of 2018.

Prachanda and Deuba are unlikely political allies.

Deuba headed the cabinet that offered a bounty of 5 million rupees ($50,000) for Prachanda in 2001, at the peak of the insurgency. Two years later, Maoist guerrillas shot up Deuba's convoy in west Nepal, but he escaped unhurt.

Endangered tiger numbers have nearly doubled in Nepal in just three years, thanks to conservation efforts led by the Department of National Parks and Wildlife Conservation, supported by the National Trust for Nature Conservation (NTNC) and the Zoological Society of London (ZSL).

Survey figures released on International Tiger Day (July 29), show that Endangered Bengal tiger (Panthera tigris) numbers have risen dramatically since the Society and its partners began their important conservation work in the Chitwan-Parsa tiger complex in 2014.

ZSL collaborated with The Government of Nepal’s Department for National Parks and Wildlife Conservation (DNPWC), the National Trust for Nature Conservation (NTNC) and Panthera, the global wild cat conservation organization, to carry out the 2016 survey in Parsa - as part of their ongoing partnership to protect and monitor tigers throughout the lowlands of Nepal.

ZSL’s Conservation Programmes Director, Professor Dr Jonathan Baillie said: “Success for tiger conservation requires viable habitats, stringent protection, effective monitoring and community engagement and when those conditions are in place, tiger numbers will flourish as Parsa Wildife Reserve in Nepal has demonstrated very clearly. Nepal’s exemplary track record in conserving its iconic wildlife makes it a conservation leader in the South Asian region.”

Today, just 3,900 wild tigers remain in all of Asia, largely due to poaching for the illegal wildlife trade. In 2013 Nepal was estimated to support 198 Bengal tigers; the latest survey confirms that Parsa is now home to approximately 90% more.

Nepal’s Director General of the Department of National Parks and Wildlife Conservation Krishna Prasad Acharya said: ‘The tiger population in Parsa Wildlife Reserve has significantly increased since the last census, this is fantastic news for tigers and it demonstrates that Nepal’s dedicated conservation efforts are delivering clear results. Nepal has committed to doubling its tiger population by 2022 and encouraging results like these show that we are on track to achieve that.”

Panthera Senior Tiger Program Director, Dr. John Goodrich, stated: “The impressive doubling of tigers in Parsa, and the almost unprecedented speed of this recovery, is testament to how law enforcement and strong government leadership can help save the species. At a time when poachers are waging an all-out war against wildlife, Nepal serves as a beacon of hope for the tiger.”

Goodrich continued: “The country’s conservation model and the courageous spirit of those working to protect Nepal’s natural heritage, particularly given the devastating earthquake of April 2015, must be celebrated and replicated to ensure the tiger lives on throughout Asia.”

The Chitwan-Parsa complex - made up of Chitwan National Park and the Parsa Wildlife Reserve -contains nearly 2000 km2 of contiguous tiger habitat and is one of the highest priority landscapes for conservation in Nepal.

Since 2014, ZSL and Panthera have collaborated in the Parsa Wildlife Reserve to monitor tigers and their prey using camera traps, and provide training for effective law enforcement training and the use of the SMART system - a computer-based platform that improves the effectiveness of wildlife patrols.

Parsa is also a trial site for innovative conservation technologies which have been effectively deployed to provide valuable information to park managers including ZSL’s seismic and magnetic sensors and Panthera’s PoacherCam – a remote camera that distinguishes people from wildlife and can transmit images to law enforcement, to stop poaching.

ZSL in partnership with the DNPWC has also recently equipped and supported the deployment of a state of the art Rapid Response Patrol team in PWR which further strengthens the park management’s capacity to prevent tiger poaching before it takes place.

Over the next few years ZSL and Panthera plan to expand their conservation efforts to three other protected areas that are home to tigers in the lowlands of Nepal with Nepal’s DNPWC as the lead and with full support of our national partner NTNC.

Learn more about ZSL’s partnership with Nepal, including the rhino population:

Floods and landslides in Nepal and India have killed more than 90 people in recent days, with at least two million residents forced to flee their homes, officials said Thursday.

Nepal has been worst hit, with homes and bridges destroyed after days of torrential monsoon rains, although water levels were now slowing receding.

“Since Monday, 73 people have been killed in the floods and landslides,” home ministry deputy spokesman Jhanka Nath Dhakal told AFP, increasing the death toll from Tuesday after the discovery of 15 more bodies.

“Our teams are working continuously in affected areas to search and rescue. We are also providing relief to the victims.” Images released by the army, which is involved in the operations, showed villagers waiting on rooftops to be evacuated in motorboats.

The worst-hit district was Pyuthan, 250 kilometers (150 miles) west of Kathmandu, where dozens of houses have been swept away.

Scores of people die every year from flooding and landslides during the monsoon rains in Nepal and neighboring India.

The situation is particularly desperate this year because scores of thousands of Nepalis are still living in tents or makeshift huts after a devastating earthquake that killed nearly 9,000 people in 2015.

Yesterday, CPN (Maoist Centre) Chairman Pushpa Kamal Dahal aka 'Prachanda' announced that he was all set to make a comeback as Prime Minister of Nepal, a week after the Nepali Congress and Madhes-based parties pledged to throw their weight behind him.

The resignation of Prime Minister K.P. Sharma Oli earlier in the day paved the way for Prachanda to become the 39th Prime Minister of the Himalayan nation.

He got the coveted post in 2008 for the first time when the Maoists became the largest party in the Constituent Assembly but the stint did not last beyond one-and-half years.

Though the Nepali Congress and the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist Centre) had moved a no-confidence vote against Oli, which was due for continued discussion followed by a vote thereon in Parliament on Sunday, Oli announced his resignation minutes before the discussion -- begun on Friday -- recommenced.

According to the constitutional provisions, President Bidhya Devi Bhandari will call on Parliament to install a consensus-based government within seven days, which seems a difficult proposition as the second largest party -- the Oli-led Communist Party of Nepal (Unified Marxist-Leninist) -- is all set to stay in the opposition.

The single largest party, the Nepali Congress, has already extended its support for Prachanda and signed an agreement that the former Maoist leader will lead the government for the first nine months.

Thereafter, Prachanda will hand over the leadership to Nepali Congress President Sher Bahadur Deuba.

As per the agreement, Prachanda will hold local elections that have not been held for the last 20 years, while Deuba will hold elections to the provincial assemblies and Parliament during the remaining nine months.

My friends -- photographer Sujoy Das and author Lisa Choegyal -- have spent a lifetime in Nepal. Nepal Himalaya: A Journey through Time captures their journey, combining Sujoy's beautiful black and white mountain images with a reflective essay by Lisa on how tourism first started in Nepal. The Foreword by famed mountaineer Reinhold Messner is included below.

A seasoned trekker and photographer, Sujoy Das (www.sujoydas.com) feels most at home in the high Himalaya. Founder of South Col Expeditions, he has introduced many trekkers to the magic of the Everest and Annapurna regions in Nepal, where he has been photographing for more than 25 years. His images and accompanying essays have featured in Washington Post, Insight Guides, Outdoor Journal, Outlook Traveller and many other publications. He has co-authored and photographed several books including Sikkim - A Travellers Guide and Lonely Planet Nepal for the Indian Traveller.

British-born Lisa Choegyal has made Kathmandu her home since the 1970s, deeply involved with Nepal tourism and conservation. Lisa worked for 25 years with Tiger Tops Nepal and the Tiger Mountain group, one of Asia’s foremost nature and adventure tourism pioneers. As a specialist consultant in pro-poor sustainable tourism, she works throughout the Asia Pacific region. Author and editor of several books including Kathmandu Valley Style, The Nepal Scene, Offerings from Nepal and South Asia titles of the Insight Guide series, and serves as a trustee on a number of social and conservation organizations. Since 2010, Lisa is New Zealand's Honorary Consul to Nepal.

Reinhold Messner is an Italian mountaineer, adventurer, explorer, and author of over 60 books.

He made the first ascent of Mount Everest without supplemental oxygen, along with Peter Habeler, and was the first climber to ascend all fourteen peaks over 8,000 meters (26,000 ft) above sea level, including Mount Everest. Below is his Foreword:

FOREWORD by Reinhold Messner

The country of Nepal has recently suffered greatly with both natural and man made disasters. This beautiful book with its stark and startling black and white images shows us the very essence of Nepal's mountains and Himalayan peoples, evoking the unparalleled scenery, resilience and charm of this extraordinary country. Sujoy Das has a long association with Nepal, leading many treks throughout the length and breadth of the country. The epilogue in memory of the terrible earthquakes of April and May 2015 is particularly poignant, and reminds us of the harsh realities of mountain life in this seismically active zone. Climate change has resulted in droughts, floods, and melting glaciers, and driven many of the younger population to abandon their hill villages to seek work overseas. Lisa Choegyal’s introduction and captions remind us how key tourism has been in bringing benefits to local communities since trekking first began in the mid-1960s. Even today, trekking and mountaineering are essential to help restore the economy after the earthquakes. Visitors to Nepal not only bring money to rebuild lives after the massive destruction of villages, but also bring hope that the world cares about Nepal’s plight. This book conveys the magic and beauty, and is an exciting new addition to the body of work inspired by the Nepal Himalaya. My respect for the schicksalsergeben (resigned to one’s fate) and strength of the Nepali people is infinite, but without our help and support their road to recovery will be much harder.

The formal swearing-in ceremony in Dharamsala on 27 May 2016, of Lobsang Sangay, re-elected as “Sikyong” or political leader of Tibetans in exile, marked the end of the second elections to the post since the Dalai Lama handed over political authority in March 2011. These elections attracted notice, though, because they revealed the divisive differences simmering within the Tibetan diaspora. The Dalai Lama’s undiminished influence over the Tibetan people was at the same time demonstrated when he intervened to temper campaign rhetoric. His presence at the swearing-in ceremony endorsed the election process and indicated confidence in the 48-year old Harvard-educated Lobsang Sangay.

The recent elections to choose the Sikyong and 45 members of the Tibetan Parliament-in-Exile, brought differences and discontent to the surface. Extant ferment among exiled Tibetans was exacerbated by personality clashes, factional and regional rivalries and apparent generational differences among competing politicians, with a section of younger Tibetans questioning the Dalai Lama’s “Middle Way” approach. The development has the potential to weaken cohesiveness of the Tibetan community in exile. It will also aid China’s persistent efforts to undermine the influence of the present Dalai Lama, sow division among the different Tibetan Buddhist sects, and facilitate acceptance by them of the next Dalai Lama who the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) leadership in Beijing has declared it would appoint. At least three Tibetan Buddhist sects have till now shown an inclination to engage with China.

The first sign of trouble was the rumour that spread after the first round of elections in October 2015, when largely younger supporters of pro-Independence (“Rangzen”) candidate, Lukar Jam, claimed that the counting had been rigged. There was, however, no questioning the immense lead obtained by Lobsang Sangay or the “Speaker” Penpa Tsering. The Central Tibetan Administration had, on its part, ensured that the elections provided a platform to candidates representing differing viewpoints including the “Rangzen”, or pro-independence group.

There were other indicators of discontent. A set of new rules announced by the Tibetan Election Commission on 19 October 2015 for selecting candidates for final voting for the post of Sikyong in March 2016, prompted objections. Within a month, 52 Tibetans living in various countries questioned the rules and said if the independent Election Commission does not follow the rule of law it sets a bad precedent for Tibetan democracy and can “lead to rule by the people in power and authority in future”.

Within weeks, 27 long-time, foreign-based, Tibet supporters expressed reservations about the Tibetan electoral process. They accused the Tibetan Election Commission of “politicising” the process and opening the possibility of “behind-the-scenes manipulation for political purposes”. Pertinently, their letter warned that the financial assistance and support extended by Tibet Supporters and Tibet Support Groups around the world should not be taken for granted. Their public initiative remains inexplicable.

There were other more direct signs of dissatisfaction. On 28 February 2016, Dicky Chhoyang, a Canadian citizen of Tibetan descent, stepped down as Kalon (minister) and issued a statement implicitly critical of Lobsang Sangay.

Later, 77-year-old Prof Samdong Rimpoche, a widely respected Tibetan Buddhist monk and first elected head of the Tibetan government-in-exile, expressed disappointment at the trend of the elections and decided to “boycott” them. He regretted that the election process was moving away from the ideals of a party-less democracy, which did not “involve competition or opposition” and that “representatives are involved in opposing each other through their individual campaigns”. He observed “the exiled government is not heading in the right direction”.

Soon thereafter on 4 April 2016, the State Oracle of Tibet, Nechung Choegyal and Deity Tsering Chenga (Tashi Tseringma) reprimanded the CTA’s top hierarchy for their conduct during the elections. Two days later, the CTA’s two-term Minister for Security, Dongchung Ngodup, resigned. Though Dongchung Ngodup told reporters “it was a personal decision” and not due to differences or disappointment with the present Kashag, his resignation prompted speculation that it was another expression of lack of confidence in the Sikyong.

China closely monitored these elections. On 9 March, Zhu Weiqun, presently chairman of the Ethnic and Religious Affairs Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), described “the developments of the Tibetan exile polity as being a society engaged in infighting and fragmented along the lines of various social diversities”. The Dalai Lama too, in his keynote speech at the swearing-in on 27 May, cautioned against the sharpening factional and regional rivalries. Such developments could hamper the emergence of a popularly elected leadership possessing the moral authority to guide the exiled Tibetan community through what is likely to be a difficult period of transition ahead.

For the Tibetans, who have been steadfast in their religious belief for centuries despite extreme adversity and hostile terrain, the Dalai Lama’s intervention would have given pause for thought.

The following obituary was written by Lisa Choegyal, New Zealand Honorary Consul to Nepal.

Dr. Charles McDougal PhD passed away peacefully on 11 May 2016 in Kathmandu. Always known as Chuck, he was a leading tiger ecologist, conservationist, researcher and writer, who pioneered responsible wildlife tourism standards in South Asia. He is survived by his devoted wife Margie, and children Robert, Juan Carlos, Malcolm and Linda.

Originally from Colorado USA, Chuck first came to the subcontinent as an anthropologist studying the Juang tribal peoples in Orissa in eastern India and undertook the definitive study on the Kulunge Rai in Nepal. Inspired by the jungle life of Jim Corbett’s books, Chuck switched his attention to tigers, initially to hunting then soon to research and conservation, based in Nepal since the early 1960s. Chuck was a dedicated and self-effacing man with a gentle and modest manner, widely respected for his uncompromising approach to tiger conservation, and exacting standards for wildlife tourism.

As Director of Wildlife of Tiger Tops Jungle Lodge, Chitwan National Park was Chuck’s base for tiger research since 1972, giving him unrivalled access to the study and long-term monitoring of the world’s most powerful predator. Working with the government of Nepal’s Department of National Parks and Wildlife Conservation, the Smithsonian Institution of Washington DC, and teams of locally recruited trackers and naturalists, Chuck pioneered tiger census methods and introduced camera-trapping techniques to photograph and record tigers.

His painstaking research followed generations of individual animals in Chitwan National Park, resulting in one of the largest and longest-running data sets of any tiger population in the world. Chuck’s decades of work uncovered the secret world of tigers and what they need to survive in their forest habitat, providing today’s wildlife managers with the vital information required to protect these iconic animals. Chuck’s work has raised considerable donations and helped authorities develop anti-poaching policies that put many tiger poachers in gaol.

Crucial to the data collection was Chuck’s innovative development of camera-trapping in the 1970s. I vividly recall his uncharacteristic excitement when the first tiger successfully photographed himself. Chuck's Nikon F2 camera had an accessory electronic shutter release, which he wired to a switch in a homemade pressure plate, strategically placed on a path known to be used by tigers patrolling their territory. Built from two wooden planks, compression springs held the electrical contact apart. The pressure pad was buried in a shallow depression so that when a heavy animal stepped on the wooden pad the battery-powered circuit was closed, triggering the camera and its flash. Over the years he photographed hundreds of different tigers and also an impressive inventory of other creatures including sloth bears, leopards, jungle cats and the rare honey badger.

Chuck’s authoritative book, Face of the Tiger, was published in 1977, the result of thousands of hours of observation and tracking that examines the life of the tiger. Senior scientist Dr. George Schaller much admired Chuck’s work, and wrote: “His well-documented book … presents the best available account of the tiger’s social life.” Always generous by encouraging fellow researchers as co-authors, Chuck published many scientific papers himself and with colleagues, notably Professor J.L. David Smith of the University of Minnesota with whom a major work on the tiger is being published by Harvard University Press. Chuck recently completed a collection of jungle tales that will be published posthumously, which perfectly capture his abiding passion for nature and love for life in the wild.

Chuck’s interest in Asia dated back to childhood when, aged 11, he and a school friend set off walking to Tibet to meet the Dalai Lama, as part of a school project. They planned to head up through Canada to Alaska, across the Bering Straits through Russia and China to Lhasa, only to be picked up by the Chicago police on the shores of Lake Michigan! In the early 1950s he was commissioned into the US Marine Corps, before leaving military life in favour of academic studies at the University of New Mexico and at SOAS (School of Oriental and African Studies) University of London, studying with the renowned Himalayan anthropologist, Dr. Christoph von Fürer-Haimendorf.

Having made his way to Nepal he soon teamed up with English-born A.V. Jim Edwards, an enthusiast then working for Pan American World Airways (Pan Am) in New York, to found Nepal Wildlife Adventures, an early hunting company in the Nepal Terai. A winning partnership of entrepreneurial energy and wildlife acumen, the pair realised it was time to abandon hunting and embrace conservation ideals. In February 1972, Jim and Chuck took over the management of Tiger Tops Jungle Lodge from the two Texan millionaires and big game hunters, Toddy Lee Wynne Jr and Herbert W. Klein, who had started the venture in 1964 in what was then a Terai rhinoceros sanctuary. Wildlife attractions in Chitwan include tiger, rhino, gaur (South Asia’s imposing wild cattle), leopard, deer, wild boar, monkeys, crocodiles and over 540 bird species, against the backdrop of the snow-capped Himalayan peaks.

Together their brand of purist wildlife expertise combined with commercial realities to set global standards for the adventure tourism industry. Whilst Jim Edwards took care of business and marketing from the Kathmandu office, Chuck avoided the limelight. Preferring to be based in his natural habitat of the Chitwan jungles, he established Tiger Tops’ awesome reputation for high quality wildlife experiences, skilled naturalist guiding, and fierce wildlife integrity – “no bullshit” was Chuck’s creed. The evening slide show educating guests about the flora, fauna and environmental issues was written by him, narrated in his soft drawl. With a strong emphasis on nature interpretation, at its height, Tiger Tops wildlife lodges and tented camps extended throughout India as well as Nepal, with activities in Sri Lanka, Bhutan, Tibet and beyond. Tiger Tops formula of responsible wildlife tourism and conservation synergy was an acknowledged model long before ecotourism became an established concept and buzzword.

Chuck not only mentored scientists, researchers, naturalists and ornithologists, but worked with many wildlife filmmakers, including cameramen from BBC and Survival Anglia television who relied on his unrivalled field expertise to get their shots. Wildlife operations throughout South Asia today are still managed and staffed by Chuck McDougal-trained specialists, who regard the quiet American as their guru and inspiration. He had an uncanny gift for imparting information without being didactic or overbearing, always supportive to acolytes, and with a twinkle in his eye for those ready to appreciate it.

Chuck retired from Tiger Tops in 2001, and devoted himself to travel, research and writing, continuing his tiger monitoring programmes in the Nepal Terai through the International Trust for Nature Conservation of which he remained an active Trustee. Co-author of the first tiger conservation strategy for the Royal Government of Bhutan, Chuck also observed the unique tiger population of the Bangladesh Sundarbans. Among other accolades, his work received awards from Nepal’s Ministry of Forests and Soil Conservation in 1997 for his “lifelong dedication to tiger conservation in Nepal”, from WWF the Abraham Conservation Award in 2006, and from Himalayan Nature the Brian Hodgson Award in 2012. The Nepal Tiger Trust recognised him in 2014 “… for passionately mentoring ad coaching a younger generation of conservationists”.

In later years, Chuck developed a pessimistic ambivalence towards the more rampant impacts of tourism, advocating that benefits only accrue when tourism is more carefully controlled and channelled as a positive force for conservation. However, he leaves behind him legions of tourists forever grateful to him for revealing and interpreting the wonders of the subcontinent’s wildlife and jungles, and a generation of trained South Asian scientists and naturalists with unparalleled guiding integrity, skilled at showing visitors a glimpse of the wild tiger world that he so loved and valued.

It has been one year to the day since the Nepal earthquake (and the major aftershocks that followed) killed 8,959 people and injured another 22, 303. It was the biggest natural disaster to hit the Himalayan country in over 80 years. Yesterday, a protest in Kathmandu illustrated all too clearly the extent to which the Nepali people feel betrayed by their incompetent and corrupt government, which has done little to foster reconstruction or meaningful aid to the victims. This is in spite of the fact that 4.1 billion dollars was pledged by international donors. The Nepalis have been twice victimized – first by the earthquakes and second by the shameless politicization of the Nepal Reconstruction Authority (RNA).

The quake destroyed 776,895 homes. Another 298,998 require extensive repairs or have been condemned. Access to remote mountain villages have made the challenge of rebuilding more difficult. An Indian blockade of fuel, building supplies and other essential commodities also contributed to the disruption of reconstruction. As of March 2016, more than 200,000 families remain in temporary shelters – interspersed within the rubble of their fallen homes – in many cases at high altitudes where snow began falling last November.

Without help from the government forthcoming, many villagers have simply moved back into their condemned homes or built mud and rock homes on their own. They have lost all faith that they will receive money from the government.

Healthcare infrastructure has been ravaged. 1, 227 health centers were destroyed or damaged during the quake, disrupting service in the remote rural areas. To date, only 40 centers have been repaired with another 100 being worked on.

Approximately 8,000 schools were destroyed or severely damaged. Nearly 1,000,000 children were left without classrooms. With few exceptions, the students are still studying in bamboo and tin shelters, with a paucity of books and supplies to support their education.

Additionally, 131 historical monuments were reduced to rubble in the earthquake, while another 560 structures require extensive repair. In the Kathmandu Valley alone, there are seven UNESCO Heritage sites encompassing irreplaceable temples, monuments and palaces dating back hundreds of years.

WHY SUCH AN ABYSMAL RECORD?

The blame must be put squarely on the Nepali government’s back.

Nepal formed the National Reconstruction Authority (NRA) after the quake following a successful donor’s conference in June last year, when $4.1 billion was pledged, but the reconstruction authority has since failed to make meaningful headway, frustrating both donors and survivors.

This was all due to political wrangling and foot-dragging – each political party wanting to have a say in how the donations were to be spent and who would be in control of the money. Ironically, the parties have nevertheless been reluctant to take a lead in reconstruction in fear of public scrutiny: Historically, Nepal’s government agencies have an astonishingly bad record of spending aid money because of corruption and bureaucratic barriers. The NRA took its full shape only in December of last year and little has been achieved since then. As of last month, little more than 3% of the required budget for rebuilding has been released or spent, revealing the extent to which the government’s political commitment is hollow.

In the meantime, the victims of the earthquake are staring hard at the calendar. Monsoon season is only two months away. They’ve already spent one monsoon season in temporary shelters and they know all too well how little protection from the rain these makeshift shelters provided.

Many of the displaced are simply racing against the clock to rebuild their homes on their own, with little money, and no expertise in how to construct an earthquake-proof structure. They would rather take their chances with Mother Nature than the Government of Nepal.

Below is my Forward for the English translation of General Rookmangud Katawal’s best-selling autobiography, launched in Kathmandu on April 2, 2016. I also acted as editor of the translation. The book is published by Nepa-laya Publishers and is now available at all bookstores in Kathmandu. Soon, it will be available on Amazon as well.

Foreword by Mikel Dunham

When I first met General Rookmangud Katawal, he was at the height of his career. It was during a pivotal moment in Nepal’s history. Only a few days before, on April 10, the historic 2008 Constituent Assembly Elections had been held. Prior to the elections, the country thrummed with trepidation over regional outbreaks, mob threats and the probability of widespread violence in and around the polling stations. As it turned out, the day came and went with less hostility than predicted. The unexpected victory of the Maoists sparked self-congratulatory dancing in the streets. The defeated parties hung back in shell-shocked silence. The king had not yet made a public statement. Whatever one’s party affiliation may have been, there was palpable relief that – if nothing else – the long-postponed event was finally over. The day I drove to Army Headquarters, there was still celebration in the air, but also emerging sobriety – a kind of election-day hangover. The country had undeniably reached a turning point. But now what? The rollercoaster ride wasn’t over. The opportunities and challenges were multifold; both required ethics and transparency, attributes in short supply among the political parties.

I interviewed General Katawal on the top floor of the sprawling Army Headquarters. Brigadier General Rajendra Chhetri invited me to ink my signature in HQs’ oversized guest book. I signed directly below the two previous visitors: Jimmy Carter and American Ambassador to Nepal Nancy Powell. I then followed Chhetri further down the hallway, windowed on the right side, the panes streaked with late afternoon rain. The view was looking down over Kathmandu. I couldn’t decide if HQs’ vantage point was above the fray or at the very heart of it.

Chhetri stopped at a door on the left, knocked, paused, then ushered me into a dimly lit, expansive, but sparsely appointed conference room. Stretching away in the background was an impressive table that might seat a score of brass. There were two non-military oil paintings – mountainscapes – on the paneled walls and that was about it in terms of visual diversion. Closer to the entrance was a heavy desk and a seating arrangement of crimson stuffed armchairs with matching sofa.

The Chief of Army Staff was alone. Chhetri left us, closing the door behind him.

The ironclad handshake of General Katawal is something one doesn’t forget. Coupled with direct eye contact and upturned anvil jaw, his grip conveys a message that here is a man who once topped the 61-day United States Army Ranger School, and who probably could still carry, without flinching, 40 kilos of weaponry and equipment on his back.

General Katawal asked me to take a seat on the sofa. Cameras and recorders were forbidden so I pulled out a notebook and pen. Before I could ask my first question, Katawal cut to the chase: “What do you want?”

It was meant as a challenge and I appreciated it. It was like pitching a movie to a producer. You had five minutes to either sell your story or get booted. He didn’t care if I liked him or not, which I found refreshing after having interviewed numerous politicians, including Maoists, who seemed to be taking a civilized break in front of the camera before resuming their dogfights. The main political actors in the continually changing governments of Nepal – supporting each other one day, betraying each other the next – offered me pre-scripted answers, with attendants nearby to cut short interviews should their bosses tread thin ice or should I become too annoying. In stark contrast was General Katawal. He was perfectly comfortable being alone with me. He didn’t need backup. Who he was today, he would be tomorrow.

I put my questions aside. Instead, I briefed him on what my recent activities in Nepal had entailed. The Election Commission of Nepal had chosen me to be one of their international observers. On Election Day, I canvassed three districts – Morang, Sunsari and Dhankuta – pinpointing various polling stations that had experienced tampering in the past. I saw plenty of irregularities. I photographed a twelve-year-old boy stuffing “his” ballot into the box with a policeman standing three feet away. I saw entrances to polling stations flanked by scores of sullen but intimidating YCL members, sitting in the shade and monitoring the locals who dared to vote. I took a side-trip to a hospital in Darang, where a man was said to be in critical condition from a beating at the Bhutaha polling station. When I arrived, he had already died. At twilight, on the return trip to Biratnagar, my car was stopped and surrounded in Itahiri by a large group of young drunk thugs. No security in sight. After some fairly aggressive haggling, my international observer vehicle was reluctantly waved through. As I approached Biratnager around 8:45pm, I videoed a squad of armed police retrieving an unexploded bomb. As I entered the small hotel where I was spending the night, I heard Jimmy Carter’s voice blaring from the television mounted on the wall of the dining room next to the entrance. A group of reporters were gathered there, looking up at the screen. The ex-president – who was in Nepal, but never left the Kathmandu Valley – was proclaiming that the elections had been peaceful, free and fair. The reporters laughed at his naïve appraisal. It only then that the general smiled and took over the conversation.

The whole problem in Nepal was misinformation, he told me. His frustration was evident in his tightened lips. Everyone dismissed him as the “adopted son of King Mahendra” and therefore jumped to the conclusion that he was against democracy. Nothing could have been further from the truth, he told me. He supplied me with a thumbnail sketch of his hardscrabble childhood in the eastern part of Nepal, far away from the Kathmandu-centric elite. He told me, in no uncertain terms, that his supposed close connection to the royal family was a fairytale. He believed in the constitution and rule of law. More important, he believed that one of the main duties of the Nepal Army was to protect the constitution and rule of law.

The man spoke from his chest and from his heart. I could take it or leave it. I left Army HQs aware that there had been no interview, per se. I never published a word from that 40-minute meeting. But I came away with something far more valuable: someone to respect.

Although I don’t live in Nepal, I return here frequently and, if possible, touch base with General Katawal. After his retirement in 2009, and the klieg lights moved elsewhere, the general and I became trusted friends.

I was in Nepal during the horrific 2015 earthquakes. Although it was difficult to reach anyone in Kathmandu by phone, I was in contact with Katawal every day. Finally, five days after the first quake, I had dinner with the general and his family at his home. There was a large tent set up in his garden where his wife, daughter-in-law and her children slept. He preferred bunking in his office on the ground floor, with quick exit to the outside when the never-ending aftershocks became too threatening. It was during that typical Nepali dinner – one of the best I’ve ever had – that he asked me if I would be interested in editing the English translation of his autobiography. I pounced on the opportunity.

What man had experienced a more intimate relationship with the broad spectrum of Nepali culture and society – from powerless peasants to the aristocracy of old Nepal? Katawal was like a Nepali timeline incarnate.

He was born in 1948, just when the stage was being set for the demise of the 100-year-old reign of the Ranas. He was a toddler when King Tribhuwan returned to Nepal from Indian exile and re-established Shah rule. The pampered existence of the royal family was as distant from his goat-herding childhood as was Kathmandu from Okhaldhunga, the isolated district where he was born. But local holy men said he was destined for great things and his mother took the prophesy to heart, instilling in him a relentless drive to get a proper education and rise to the top.

It was King Mahendra, assuming the throne in 1955, who gave young Rookmangud his chance to break away from a rural existence. On a royal tour of eastern Nepal, Mahendra heard the young lad recite poetry, was impressed by the boy’s intellect (and perhaps amused by his bravado), and selected him to be taken to one of the preeminent schools in the Kathmandu Valley, Pharping Boarding School. This was one year before a new constitution was written wherein the king accepted the establishment of a parliamentary government.

Rookmangud found himself in classrooms with boys who came from some of the most privileged families in Nepal. It was a challenge to fit in, but he made a name for himself by taking first in most of his classes. Meanwhile, in 1960, Mahendra launched a royal coup, jailed political party leaders and established absolute rule, thus putting an end to the nascent development of democracy in Nepal. In its place, the king established the Panchayat system, basically a one-party system grafted to bolster Mahendra’s rule.

In 1969, Katawal began his career in the then Royal Nepal Army, eventually graduating from the Indian National Defense Academy, receiving a Bachelor of Arts from Tribhuwan University, a Master’s Degree in National Defense from Pakistan’s Qaeda Azam University, the Distinguished International Honor Graduate of the US Special Forces Course, the Gideon Award in the US Ranger Course, and a graduate of UK’s Army Command and Staff College. He had come a long way from his rural years, when, in order to be able to practice writing the alphabet, he had had to make his own ink from soot.

In 1972, King Birendra assumed the throne, continuing his deceased father’s absolute rule in Nepal.

While Katawal was given increasingly key Army staff appointments, Birendra was faced with growing hostility from his subjects. In 1979, a nationwide pro-democracy movement erupted in protest of the Panchayat system. The following year a national referendum was held that resulted in unqualified support for the Panchayat system, although many thought the process had been rigged. Minor amendments to the constitution were announced to mollify the public. But in 1981, when elections to the National Panchayat were held, the political parties boycotted the elections, a process repeated in 1983 and with the same dubious results.

That same year, Katawal left Nepal along with his family. He had been selected for the plum assignment of becoming Nepal’s Government’s Liaison Officer to the Brigade of Gurkhas of the British Army and Government of Hong Kong. The position was for three years and, during that stint, he had numerous opportunities to host the royal family en route to and from their various international tours. Katawal was nothing, if not a careerist, and he made the most of the opportunity by developing relationships with people who, otherwise, would have been beyond his station in life.

In 1988, he was appointed the Chief Military Personnel Officer of the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon.

While Katawal’s career constantly moved upward, King Birendra’s Panchayat system – ever more dysfunctional and despised – was on the verge of collapsing. In 1989, India imposed an economic embargo on Nepal. It struck a devastating blow to the nation’s economy and, in turn, enraged the people, who put the blame squarely on Birendra’s shoulders. This led to the 1990 People’s Movement (Jana Andolan), which resulted in the promulgation of a new constitution that significantly compromised the Crown’s power and legitimized a multiparty democratic system.

Meanwhile, after serving in the Research and Development Wing at Army HQs, Katawal became Commandant of the Royal Nepalese Military Academy in 1993.

In 1996, Katawal was promoted to Brigadier General. Some of his superiors – all hailing from the rarified background of the ruling class – were fond of telling Katawal that, no matter how well he performed, a poor eastern boy with no pedigree would “never become Chief of Army Staff.” And they weren’t joking. An Army Chief’s last name was either “Rana”, “Shah”, “Basnyat” or “Thapa”. One of the most interesting things about Katawal’s life story is that, the higher he rose in the Army hierarchy, the more he encountered the pushback, the rigidity of the upper class. The discrimination wasn’t universal, but the undercurrent was always there. Likewise, as he rose through the ranks, his direct access to the palace became increasingly restricted. The king’s inner circle, all from the old aristocracy, distrusted this “upstart”, this “easterner” and further stigmatized him – quite erroneously – as an avid supporter of the pro-democratic Nepali Congress political party.

The same year that Katawal became a Brigadier General, a Maoist faction of the Communist Party of Nepal went underground and declared a “People’s War”. At first, most of the politicians in Kathmandu labeled the Maoists as “terrorists”, but otherwise paid insufficient attention to them, tucked away as they were in the western hilly districts of Rolpa, Rukum, Pyuthan and Salyan. Out of sight, out of mind. Besides, the political parties were too preoccupied with their interminable internecine war with one another. Corruption, coercion, lust for ministerial offices and jealousy of each other’s power was the political culture of Nepal. Between 1991 and 2000, there were ten different governments – the perfect storm for political instability – and the crafty Maoists took full advantage of it.

In 1999, Katawal became Director of Military Intelligence. No one in Nepal was in a better position to see the Maoist threat and yet there was little that he or the Army could do, since the palace had refused to mobilize the Army in order to crush the insurgents. That job was left to the police and later, in 2001, the newly created Armed Police Force.

On June 1, 2001, an unspeakable tragedy occurred that rocked the nation: the Palace Massacre. At a private family dinner party, Crown Prince Dipendra apparently gunned down his father, his mother, his brother, his sister and numerous other royal family members before turning the gun on himself. Soon after, without knowing what had actually taken place, General Katawal was ordered to rush to HQs and stay there. As the hours passed, information slowly trickled in. Prince Dipendra was still alive, in a coma, intensive care. Against strict orders, Katawal jumped on a motorcycle and raced to the hospital:

Chhauni Hospital was heavily guarded. Members of the royal family were filing in with stunned looks on their faces. Despite so many people milling about, the hospital was eerily quiet.

After sunrise, he managed to get into Dipendra’s room:

The crown prince’s head was completely covered in bandages. He was unconscious. His motionless body lay on the bed and I gave up hope of him ever coming out of this alive…

Katawal’s account of the aftermath of the Palace Massacre is one of his autobiography’s most poignant narrations. By the next morning, although the palace was ridiculously slow to admit what had happened, the basic facts of the tragedy leaked out to the public and the nation was overcome by grief, suspicion and, above all, anger. Katawal remembers:

… there was no time to grieve. I was assigned to arrange the funeral procession.

That evening, I took my position in the procession and walked beside King Birendra’s body. The streets were overflowing with mourners. The shock of the event was palpable and, in many ways, the cortège was surreal. Hooligans near Swayambhu threw stones at Prime Minister Girija Prasad Koirala’s car. Their anger was not only directed at the Prime Minister. Prince Gyanendra was being singled out, as well. Many suspected that he was somehow behind the massacre.

Dipendra finally succumbed to his head wound, and his uncle, Gyanendra, was crowned king. Thirteen days later, Katawal was promoted to Major General. It was a ceremony filled with mixed emotions. Birendra had supported Katawal’s career – from the beginning of his reign until his ghastly death.

It wasn’t long after the Palace Massacre that Katawal took over as Adjutant General of the Nepal Army. In November 2001, following a breakdown of peace talks with the government, the Maoists ended a four-month-old ceasefire with a wave of attacks on police posts and army barracks. King Gyanendra declared a state of emergency, erasing a decade of civil liberties including freedom of press and freedom of assembly. The following year, in October 2002, the king sacked the entire cabinet, assumed executive powers and indefinitely postponed parliamentary polls. The “People’s War” intensified.

By May 2003, nearly 7,200 Nepalis had been killed in the Maoist revolt, with no end in sight. Five of the six political parties with seats in the dismissed parliament had had their fill of King Gyanendra’s direct rule and launched the Joint People’s Movement. A new slogan gained momentum: Abolish the monarchy and establish Nepal as a republic. The increased political chaos, coupled with the rising number of dead from the guerrilla conflict was reaching the boiling point. And it was at this juncture, at the end of the year, that General Katawal was selected to command the army’s Western Division – ground zero – the very area where the “People’s War” had begun seven years before. According to the Maoists, it was completely under their control.

The national and international media parroted ad nauseam the Maoists’ claim. Katawal capitalized on his transfer to Western Nepal by revealing a different picture in the hinterlands. For example, he foiled the Maoists’ attempt to block King Gyanendra’s scheduled tour of Western Nepal. The Army cleared the path; Gyanendra made his scheduled stops and Katawal made sure the media was there to cover it. “Where are the Maoists?” Katawal asked the cameras. In addition, Katawal focused on ramping up development projects that increased interaction and trust with the local villages. The Army and Police presence was so great in places that numerous Maoist leaders were driven across the Indian border. Not surprisingly, Katawal was in the crosshairs of Maoist leadership. But since they were powerless to actually kill him, they resorted to a cowardly alternative: Katawal’s wife began getting anonymous phone calls, advising her to buy a white sari – the customary garb for a widow.

In September 2004, Katawal was promoted to Lieutenant General and took over as Chief of General Staff. Being back in Kathmandu was perhaps more contentious than his direct skirmishes with rebels in the West. The king was getting into the habit of dismissing prime ministers on an almost yearly basis. He blamed them for failing to hold elections on time and not being able to bring Maoists leaders to a roundtable negotiation. Finally, on 1 February 2005, Gyanendra declared himself absolute ruler, promising the country that he would return Nepal to normalcy within three years. His announcement was unapologetically heavy handed and he repressed any form of dissent, restricting civil liberties, including freedom of speech. By the time the royal address was over, all of Nepal’s mobile phone networks and landlines went dead. The king had ordered a nationwide communication blackout.

The diplomatic community publicly denounced the move as a “setback to democracy.” But off the record, ambassadors told Katawal:

If peace can be restored by bringing the Maoists to the democratic process, then the King should be allowed to do so. This will also be a major lesson for the political leaders, who have spent all of their time fighting amongst themselves. We think the King’s move is the best solution to rescue Nepal from the present political crisis.

Initially, a surprisingly large percentage of Nepal’s population condoned the king’s move: Nothing else had worked, so why not give the king a chance to turn things around? Katawal also supported the king’s takeover but not necessarily his methods. He was particularly concerned that censorship of the media would come back to haunt the king. And then there was this:

No one objected when the King took steps to bring the parties in line, but now it seemed he was concentrating on consolidating his own power by removing anyone who didn’t agree with him. He excluded the Congress and UML from his Cabinet of Ministers and selected former office-bearers from the Panchayat regime. There was no evidence that these throwbacks to the past would improve governance… Less than a month after the royal takeover, seven secretaries were dumped. People who had served the monarchy were being punished, triggering fear and paranoia among government officials. Their faith in the monarchy was crumbling fast.

Ambassadors were now unwelcome at the palace. To make matters more insular, the King’s inner circle of sycophants never challenged the king’s mulish – if not delusional – decisions. At a time when he should have been exhibiting flexibility, the King became even more rigid. Domestically, he had turned his back on the political parties and they had countered by turning their backs on him. In fact, they had come to the conclusion that it would be far more profitable to dialogue with the Maoists, the king’s archenemies.

For all practical purposes it was Gyanendra, himself, who was destroying the monarchy. Although no royalist, Katawal believed in the merits of a well-managed constitutional monarchy. Even a merely symbolic monarchy, with no real power of its own, offered historic continuity to a nation that was in dire need of unifying assets. From 2005, up until Gyanendra was dethroned and evicted from Narayanhiti Palace, Katawal sought private audiences with the king in order to shed light on the king’s precarious situation. On the few occasions that he did manage to speak to the king in private, Gyanendra either left in mid-sentence or responded with a royal sneer.

The Five-Party Alliance grew into a Seven-Party Alliance and, on 22 November 2005, they officially joined hands with the Maoists. Together, they agreed to resolve the 10-year conflict through political negotiations. Without the palace’s participation, they converged in Delhi and inked a 12-Point Agreement that called for the abolishment of absolute monarchy and addressed a spate of other contentious problems, including those involving class, caste, gender and economics.

It was a game-changer. The Maoists came out of hiding and took to the streets. On 6 April 2006, they and the united parties declared the People’s Movement (Jana Andolan II). Normal life screeched to a halt. The world watched, day after day, as the protestors swelled to the tens of thousands, while security forces in riot gear and tanks blocked the perimeters of the royal palace.

Finally, on 21 April, the King announced that he would restore parliament, thinking that that would solve the problem. He was deluded; it was a case of too-little-too-late. The Maoists and the Seven-Party Alliance gave him an ultimatum: The protests would continue until a Constituent Assembly was formed and the monarchy was abolished. The next day, the streets of Kathmandu swelled to hundreds of thousands of protestors. Finally, on 24 April, the king announced he was stepping down.

Six months later, on 18 September 2006, Rookmangud Katawal was sworn in as the new Chief of Army Staff (COAS). He was the first Commander-in-Chief of the Nepal Army to come from a common family. At a time when much of the public dismissed the Army as aristocratic, reactionary and a stooge of the beleaguered monarchy, Katawal’s unprecedented promotion should have sent a message that the Army was not that easy to stereotype. On the contrary, the streets were rife with the rumor that it was only a matter of time before the Army – in secret collaboration with the disgraced king – would stage a military coup. In fact, Katawal was approached on numerous occasion by leading figures to do precisely that, but he refused to act against the constitution.

The United Nations Mission in Nepal (UNMIN), arrived in Nepal in early 2007 to oversee the scheduled 2008 Constituent Elections and, more important, to monitor the the 28 cantonments, which were set up to house the Maoist ex-combatants until they could be reintegrated into society. Almost from the beginning, UNMIN’s presence was plagued with questions of its neutrality, as well as its ability (or inclination) to correctly cipher Maoist irregularities. Early on, UNMIN conducted a headcount of the rebels to weed out child soldiers and new people recruited after the peace agreement was in place. Their count was just under 20,000 combatants. The Army did everything in its power to point out the headcount discrepancies but UNMIN Director Ian Martin wasn’t listening. (In 2009, however, the UNMIN’s verification process became a source of embarrassment after a secret videotape of Maoist Supremo Prachanda caught him boasting to his followers that he had duped UNMIN by padding the camps with young people who didn’t actually qualify. The real number of the People’s Liberation Army, according to Prachanda, was actually between 7,000-8,000. Even that was an inflated figure.)

The April 2008 National Elections results indicated that the Maoists had won a surprising majority of the seats in the Constituent Assembly (CA). They did not achieve a mandate, but they were clearly in a position to take over the government. In May, the CA abolished the monarchy and pronounced Nepal a republic. Ram Baran Yadav (of the opposition Nepali Congress party) became Nepal’s first President. Prachanda became Prime Minister.

General Katawal spent most of his COAS tenure dealing with army bashing, with Maoist duplicity, and with formulating a practical solution to reintegrating the ex-rebels, while, at the same time, preserving the integrity of the Nepal Army. His job became even more besieged after Prachanda became Prime Minister:

With the King effectively neutralized, the Maoists turned their attention to bringing the Army to its knees. They knew very well that the Army was the only disciplined, well-knitted and professionally united institution in the country. Their goal was to put the Army under their control – a vital step if they were to achieve their ultimate goal: to complete their process of state capture. They were prepared to go to any lengths to accomplish that. [They] had done an excellent job in manipulating the media by portraying the Nepal Army as rapists, murderers, and basically the private army of the ex-King. [On the other hand] …the international community admired and relied on the Nepal Army for its decades of professional participation in UN peace missions. In other parts of the world, the Nepal Army represented the very model of an institution dedicated to maintaining peace and stability.

Nevertheless, Prachanda pushed on, dead-set on forcing the Army to integrate – wholesale – 19,000 “ex-rebels”, a group with far less education, questionable skills and virtually no professional military training or experience on a par with the Nepal Army’s international standards. For Katawal, the consummate military professional, meeting Prachanda’s demand would be the equivalent of allowing the army to be destroyed. That was not going to happen on Katawal’s watch.

Prachanda focused on issues he thought could destroy Katawal: controversy over Katawal’s alleged close affiliation with the ruling class and the Indian government; Army recruiting issues regarding replacing eight generals, who were facing retirement; and the Army’s boycotting of a Sports Tournament that Prachanda had tried to commandeer with members of his youth group, the Young Communist League. Based on these “transgressions”, Prachanda unilaterally sacked Katawal.

His autocratic ploy backfired. The Communist Party of Nepal (Unified Marxist Leninist), a pivotal party in the coalition, withdrew from the government in protest. This was followed by the President of Nepal overriding Prachanda’s bold move and ordering Katawal to continue as COAS. This, in turn, resulted in Prachanda’s furious resignation in May 2009, followed by the collapse of the Maoist government. This final “Prachanda vs. Katawal” battle-of-wills is recounted in the last chapter of Katawal’s autobiography – a political thriller if there ever was one.

Katawal has often been portrayed as arrogant, which is a fair assessment. But after reading his life story, I don’t believe he was ever conceited. He merely took pride in what he had achieved on his own. He had faith in the simple mantra that upholding one’s principles was the only course of action. No doubt this had a lot to do with his soldiers’ deep admiration for him. His unwavering belief in his own abilities and in his prophesized fate of becoming a “big man”, nourished his conviction that his role was to safeguard Nepal’s stability, to protect its constitution and rule of law – no matter who was in power.

Above all, amidst the interminable political intrigue and backstabbing, Katawal emerges as man of self-empowerment – a man who, against all odds, transcended social prejudice and rose to the top of the military at precisely the moment in history when his country most needed him. Decade after decade, his story offers an insider’s view of the machinations going on behind the closed doors of Nepal’s power elite. Reading the general’s autobiography is, in essence, reading the timeline of Nepal’s struggle to emerge as a modern day democracy.

As might be expected, although Katawal has now retired from the Army, he keeps up an exhaustive schedule of reading, traveling, physical fitness, public functions, private ceremonies, and speaking at conferences and media programs.

His most recent project is the launching of Katawal Trust, an organization dedicated to improving the lives of Nepali people through education and supporting social reform to better equip the nation in dealing with the international dynamics of the 21st century.

(Note: katawaltrust.com will be launched in the upcoming weeks, where you can learn more about the not-for-profit organization.)

Kanak Mani Dixit, a writer and journalist based in Kathmandu, is founding editor of the magazine Himal Southasian. This analysis was published in The Hindu yesterday.

Without doubt, the most damaging episode in the relationship between the Indian republic and modern Nepal was the five-month economic blockade that devastated the latter’s economy, hit post-earthquake reconstruction, and created a humanitarian crisis through the autumn and deep winter.

During Nepal Prime Minister K.P. Sharma Oli’s state visit to India, which he had refused to make without the blockade being lifted, Kathmandu and New Delhi must try to understand how this crisis came about and ensure that it does not recur.

Nepal might be a small country and economy in relative size, yet the open border and the links to the teeming plains of Uttar Pradesh and Bihar make it of vital importance to India — and it is a two-and-a-half-century-old nation state with great resilience but one that can only be prosperous and inclusive as a stable, sovereign democracy.

Unfortunately, Kathmandu has lately suffered both micromanagement and macromanagement at the hands of New Delhi, which have sown the seeds of long-term instability. From involvement in government formation to meddling in Constitution drafting, New Delhi’s emissaries and agents have kept Nepal on the boil.

In the main, it is the Nepali politicians who brought things to such a pass with their weak-kneed kowtowing to Indian diplomats and apparatchiks. They allowed the vital links with New Delhi’s national political class to fray, and slowly Nepal policy landed on the laps of unaccountable personnel. No wonder New Delhi blundered into the blockade, implemented to register dissatisfaction with the new Constitution adopted on September 20, 2015.

Tree in the forest

The blockade happened like the tree that fell in the forest — did it or did it not fall if no one heard the crash? It inflicted enormous suffering on the Nepali people, and the very sovereign status of the country teetered on the edge, and yet even after it was finally lifted, the world at large did not know that the blockade had even happened. As far as the New Delhi think tanks and opinion-makers are concerned, many did not even bother to read the new Constitution before deriding it.

Certainly the Constitution is a problematic document in many ways, even though it has the legitimacy for having been voted in favour by 85 per cent in the Constituent Assembly, which itself was elected by 78 per cent of the electorate. As a ‘rights-based Constitution’, drafted by politicians rather than by a committee of jurists, it will be a difficult document to implement because of the promises it makes — including in expanding the scope of fundamental rights to cover a whole slew of economic, social and cultural rights.

Why India carried out the blockade is the question that has taken up Kathmandu’s waking moments these past few months. Some of it may have to do with Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s annoyance that the Constitution did not declare Nepal a Hindu state, which would have helped his domestic agenda. There also seems to be some deep strategy on how to gerrymander Nepal’s federal demarcation to keep space for Indian influence on issues related to natural resources and national security.

Whatever the goals, the Indian proactivity on the Constitution was designed without reference to Nepal’s citizenry of mountain, hill and plain, and certainly with inadequate knowledge of the country’s history and demography. Most interestingly, because the news-savvy Nepali public knew who was doing the blockading, over the long months it did not revolt against the Oli government despite its numerous failings.

The New Delhi intelligentsia was more than willing to buy its Ministry of External Affairs’ suggestion that the blockade was not by India but by the plains-based parties of Nepal unhappy with the new Constitution. The Madhesi Morcha leaders were certainly protesting, but the blockade was implemented at the border points through its officials by India two days before the Morcha formally took responsibility for the blockade on September 24.

For keen observers, there is no dearth of evidence to point to the blockade’s provenance, and so it did not require Indian Foreign Minister Sushma Swaraj to inadvertently concede in the Rajya Sabha on December 7 that this was not the first but second time that India was applying a blockade on Nepal.

Truth be told, one can thank the heavens that the blockade was not implemented by the Madhesi Morcha, because that would have created an insurmountable hurdle between the communities of Nepal. Fortunately, the blockade ended before the much-feared possibility of a hill-versus-plain communal conflagration became reality, proving yet again that the people have more sagacity than the overlords.

Critiquing Kathmandu

Historically, Kathmandu’s state establishment has been insensitive in the way it has treated the Madhesi citizenry of the plains, economically marginalised and held at arm’s length on national identity which has been propagated as hill-based. Politics and bureaucracy remained the preserve of the hill Brahmin (Bahun) community in the democratic era since 1990, and so while the hill ethnicities too simmered in discontent, the plains populace erupted in the Madhes Movement of 2007-08.

The insensitivity of Kathmandu continued during the plains agitation of the past months, when police firing killed more than 40 protesters. Investigations have not been ordered into the police excesses even as, to this day, the appointment to high office continues to be skewed against the marginalised communities. Dignity of all identities is something yet to be internalised by the state.

While the historical injustices of the past are an unkind reality, the new Constitution is meant to apply redress. The question is whether the text is so inimical to the plains communities of Nepal that it cannot be addressed through amendments, and whether the South Asian superpower should have blundered into the debate.

It must be noted that the plains electorate routed the Madhesi Morcha parties in the Constituent Assembly elections of November 2013. Further, those Morcha leaders who were from the plains elite communities worried over the prospect of political oblivion when the Muslims, the ‘Nepali OBCs’, the Tharu and other plains ethnicities begin to assert their position. These leaders had little to lose in igniting passions, and were energised when New Delhi weighed in on their side, even as some individuals made speeches inciting communal violence.

Since Nepal’s democratic era started in 1990, the citizens have suffered a decade-long conflict, a decade of polarising transition, and a bad earthquake. Matters of human rights, rule of law, social justice, wealth creation, equity and employment — all of these have been kept in abeyance. The Constitution was supposed to end the suspended animation and lead towards a more secure future, but no sooner was it promulgated than the blockade hit.

In the days ahead, Nepal and Nepalis are confronted with the task of implementing the new Constitution, and the Constitutional Bench under the Supreme Court is sure to have its hands full. The Constitution is a chaotic document that will be hard to implement, but there can be no doubting that it is socially progressive, protecting diversity and inclusion as core values. There may even be matters in there to inform Indian scholars and activists, including the institution of proportional electoral representation, the absence of capital punishment, LGBT rights, and guarantees of representation by gender. There remain outstanding issues, of course, including rights of orphans and rapid citizenship for foreign husbands of Nepali women.

Looking to the future, with demarcation of federal provinces still remaining to be completed, and given India’s positioning on the matter thus far, one cannot be certain now that Nepal has turned the corner even though the blockade has been lifted. The matter of federal demarcation remains superheated, and it is probably best to let it cool before being tackled. In the meantime, Nepal should move on to local government elections, which have been hanging fire for more than a dozen years, allowing a lack of accountability to destroy democracy at the grassroots.

India and intolerance

As India is roiled by tensions within, with a myriad challenges emanating from its religious-, sectarian-, regional- and class-based divides, New Delhi must introspect on its activities in South Asia, on which so much rides. Increasingly, it seems to act unilaterally and exhibiting what might be termed ‘Indian exceptionalism’. The Nepal blockade has only been the latest in a run of recent adventurism from Bhutan to Bangladesh to Sri Lanka.

At the centre of Indian exceptionalism is the sense of entitlement that comes from being the largest democracy in the world, but the quality of that democracy certainly must be evaluated within India and by those from elsewhere who wish it well. Indeed the definition of nationalism is at the core of both the present-day disquiet under the Modi government as also the relationship with the neighbouring countries.

Nationalism, or one might say ultra-nationalism, is used to suppress dissent within each country of South Asia. It allows the state establishments alone to define international relations including with the neighbours, and simultaneously weakens the oversight and resolve of civil society, intelligentsia and media. This is happening all over, but when Big India acts without accountability among its decision-makers, the injury is transmitted all over.

The Nepal blockade should be an opportunity for New Delhi’s intelligentsia to introspect on whether it has compromised on its independent voice on international matters. The goal of South Asian solidarity in the interest of social justice requires this of New Delhi’s well-heeled. When intolerance takes root in each of our countries, it leads to closed societies and intimidates the intelligentsia.

On his state visit which starts today, Mr. Oli may prefer to let bygones be bygones and not talk about a blockade against landlocked Nepal which flouted the principles of international law, Panchsheel and good-neighbourliness. He will surely not demand reparations for the economic and humanitarian harm caused, which can be quantified. But it would be reparation enough if Nepal is allowed to pick up the pieces, to be able to reconstruct and rebuild in a sovereign space, free to make and learn from its own mistakes.

Today, finally, Nepal formally commenced the reconstruction process, nearly nine months after the massive earthquake on April 25 last year.

President Bidya Devi Bhandari and Prime Minister Khadga Prasad Sharma Oli inaugurated the much-delayed reconstruction in separate functions held in the Nepalese Capital Kathmandu on Saturday.

Government officials said that they will reconstruct about 1 million homes and buildings damaged by the massive earthquake and will also start collecting billions of aid pledged by the foreign donors during the International Conference on Nepal's Reconstruction held on June 8.

Foreign donor agencies and countries have pledged 4.1 billion U.S. dollars in aid to help Nepal rebuild after the earthquake.

Why the long delay? Political infighting

It took eight months for Nepal’s bickering political parties to approve a reconstruction bill. That was the first step.

Then, last month, the government appointed civil engineer Sushil Gyewali as CEO of Nepal’s National Reconstruction Authority (NRA).

The NRA is entrusted to handle the rebuilding of collapsed houses, office buildings, schools, hospitals and roads, and will be empowered to bypass spending rules to get the work done more quickly.

This week, Gyewali told the media that actual reconstruction work would begin in another three months to coincide with the quake’s first anniversary. In the meantime, the NRA is now preparing to deploy personnel to the 14 districts hardest-hit by the quakes.

"1,600 engineers will train technicians to build safer houses and coordinate between the government offices," Gyawali said.

But first proper identification of actual victims needs to be gathered. Apparently, astoundingly, this process has not yet been accomplished.

Gyewali added: "So the [reconstruction] authority needs to carry out detailed damage assessments and identify genuine victims, and this may take around three months."

The earthquake and ensuing aftershocks claimed nearly 9,000 lives.

Hundreds of thousands of people are still homeless in the harsh winter weather in Nepal's remote villages hit by the earthquake. For them, the next three months will be long ones. They are hopeful but, given the government’s deplorable track record, they are not holding their breath.

This analysis was sent to me by the author, Jayadeva Ranade. It was published in today’s New Indian Express. Ranade is a former Addl Secy in Cabinet Secretariat, Govt of India, and is President of the Centre for China Analysis and Strategy.

Beijing’s enhanced focus on the issue of Tibet was demonstrated in recent months when it sought to gain high-profile media advantage in its bid to undermine the Dalai Lama’s influence and acceptance in world capitals. It simultaneously ratcheted up pressure on Tibetans, including those resident inside China, while publicising its apprehension that hostile foreign powers are targeting Tibet to get involved in the Tibet issue to provoke conflict and turmoil. At a time when there has been an appreciable drop in the number of world leaders receiving the Dalai Lama and after Chinese President Xi Jinping’s successful visit to London where the UK capitulated to Beijing’s demands, Beijing secured a signal propaganda coup with the visit from November 10-13, 2015, to Tibet and Beijing of Ms Nancy Pelosi, an unwavering long-time supporter of the Dalai Lama and the US House Minority Leader.

News of the visit, the first by a US Congressional delegation to Tibet since 2008, became public only when Pelosi met Zhang Dejiang, Chairman of China’s National People’s Congress (NPC) in Beijing on November 12 and Chinese Premier Li Keqiang later that afternoon. The US delegation, comprising Jim McGovern, Alan Lowenthal, Ted Lieu, Betty McCollum, Tim Walz and Joyce Beatty, all Democrats, included no foreign journalists and was accompanied by thirty Chinese security personnel. In Lhasa, the US politicians met Chen Quanguo, Party Secretary of the Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR) reported to have been appointed at Xi Jinping’s specific behest, Baima Chilin (Padma Choling) TAR Deputy Party Secretary who has a military background and has been tough in enforcing restrictions on religion, and Qi Zhala, Party Secretary of Lhasa who was posted to Tibet from Yunnan in 2010.

The latter two are ethnic Tibetans. The state-controlled Chinese media predictably publicised the visit and tailored its coverage in accordance with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) Propaganda Department’s narrative, with the official Tibet Daily stating that Pelosi “gave high praise to the huge changes in the new Tibet and to the hard work of the Chinese government in protecting religious freedom, preserving traditional ethnic culture and protecting the ecology.”

After the meeting with Chen Quanguo and Baima Chilin on November 10, Tibet Daily quoted the TAR Party Secretary as hoping “the United States would not support any separatist activities or allow the Dalai Lama to visit.” Separately, Sichuan University Professor Luorongzandui said the delegates visited temples, schools and homes in Tibet and spoke to monks, nuns and residents. He said the itinerary was confirmed by both sides before the trip and discussions covered “sensitive topics”. Pelosi visited the Drepung, Ganden, Sera and Ramoche monasteries.

Once back in Washington, Jim McGovern described the Chinese invitation as an “important gesture” and claimed that there had been some “very heated exchanges with Chinese government officials over a whole range of issues,” including the Dalai Lama. The state-run CCTV’s evening news broadcast about the visit, however, made no reference to any such “heated” discussions. Details of the visit are yet to emerge, but China’s media will portray it as a dilution in US support to the Dalai Lama and the Tibetan cause.

Coinciding with the US Congressional delegation’s sojourn in Lhasa and apparently to show that there is no change in Beijing’s policy on Tibet, the state-run Global Times on November 11, 2015, publicised TAR Party Secretary Chen Quanguo’s remarks that “Party members and officials who secretly follow the Dalai Lama and those who secretly hold religious beliefs will be severely punished.” He stressed that Party discipline will be strictly enforced “to make sure there is no double-talking on the issue of anti-separatism in Tibet, a major battleground against separatism.”

He warned Party members and officials against participating in or supporting ethnic separatist activities, such as going on overseas pilgrimages to worship the Dalai Lama and attending prayer sessions and lectures, or sending their children and relatives to schools linked to his clique. Global Times also quoted a Tibet-based expert who requested anonymity as saying that it is “hard to identify such people because separatism is an ideological issue and is usually difficult to spot during recruitment simply through their words and deeds.” He added that “the 14th Dalai Lama has been deodorizing his image, and local governments should provide more information of his activities in a transparent and open manner.”

As the US delegation was leaving Beijing, the Global Times published another toughly-worded article on November 13. Also authored by senior Global Times journalist Li Ruohan, who often writes on issues relating to India, the article was captioned ‘Tibetan nuns, monks receive anti-espionage education.’ Disclosing that a joint promotional campaign to publicise the counter-espionage law had been launched in eight counties in Tibet this November, the article said 22 monks and nuns from three temples in Nyingchi prefecture, in southeastern Tibet across the borders with Arunachal Pradesh, received a three-hour lecture at Lamaling Temple on the counter-espionage law.

Lamaling Temple is approximately ten miles as the crow flies from the border with Arunachal Pradesh and is among the most famous monasteries of Tibetan Buddhism’s oldest Nyingma Sect. Penpa Lhamo, Deputy Head of the Contemporary Studies Institute of the Tibet Academy of Social Sciences, told Global Times that “Nyingchi is of special importance to anti-espionage efforts because there are many military sites.” Li Wei, an anti-terrorism expert with the China Institutes of Contemporary International Relations (CICIR), affiliated to the Ministry of State Security, said that “monks and nuns are considered vulnerable to espionage activities, as many senior officials in China often visit eminent monks. And temples have always been a focus of government to maintain the stability of Tibet.” He added that the Internet is extensively used for espionage activities.

The article additionally pointedly asserted that analysts believe that “many overseas intelligence agencies have targeted Tibet as a critical battleground for espionage activities, taking advantage of the active ethnic separatists in the area to provoke conflict and turmoil.” It quoted Li Wei as describing Tibet as “a significant battleground for foreign intelligence institutions,” and saying the trend is likely to continue, as ethnic separatist forces in Tibet are good targets for those agencies. The focus on Nyingchi suggests China is concerned about the situation post the XIVth Dalai Lama. It includes an inherent thinly veiled warning for India as official Chinese maps routinely depict the administrative boundaries of Nyingchi Prefecture as incorporating the entire state of Arunachal Pradesh. Senior Chinese officials travelling to TAR, including Xi Jinping, also invariably visit Nyingchi to implicitly assert China’s claim over Arunachal Pradesh.

…………………………………..

For an American perspective of Pelosi trip to China, read Bloomberg article:

At this juncture in Nepal’s fuel-deprived crisis, it can ill afford to be pulling back on alternative sources of energy.

And yet, that is exactly what is happening.

Gregory B. Poindexter, associate editor of HydroWorld.com., just posted an article announcing that Lamjung District, the epicenter of the April earthquake, has been further punished because of the ongoing blockades at border points in India and transportation strikes in Madhes.

Critical fuel delivery to several hydroelectric construction sites has stopped. As a result, work has been suspended at five hydroelectric projects. Simply put, without petrol to power construction apparatus, further construction for alternative energy is impossible.

The Upper Marsyandi-A hydroelectric facility was scheduled to begin generating power as soon as this month, but because the lack of fuel has halted construction, the project start date has been extended six months.

Chief District Officer Mohan Akela said daily, 10,000 liters of diesel and 5,000 liters of gasoline are needed, but the district is only receiving about 1,500 liters of diesel fuel deliveries each day.

Nepal has formally handed over the task of preparing detailed design of the Inland Container Depot (ICD) at Timure of Rasuwagadhi to Chinese state-owned company, Architectural Reconnaissance and Design Institute of the Tibet Autonomous Region (ARDITAR).

An agreement to this extent was signed between Laxman Bahadur Basnet, executive director of Nepal Intermodal Transport Development Board (NITDB), a government agency under the Ministry of Commerce and Supplies, which oversees all the ICDs in the country, and ARDITAR Chairman Fu Zhenghao here today.

As per the agreement, the Chinese company must submit detailed design of the project within three months. The detailed design will give NITDB an idea on the total cost of the project.

“Once the detailed design is submitted, we will immediately hand over the contract to build the port,” Basnet told The Himalayan Times.

NITDB hopes to complete construction of the ICD by late 2018 or early 2019. If Nepal is able to complete the construction within this period, it will be able to take benefit from China’s plan to expand its railway service to Kyirong.

China has already expanded railway service in Tibet to Shigatse, which is around 450 km from Kyirong. China plans to link Shigatse with Kyirong via rail service within 2020.

“Expansion of the rail service will give us an opportunity to rapidly expand trade with China because Kyirong lies at a distance of around 26 km from Rasuwagadhi,” said Basnet. The ICD, on the other hand, lies at a distance of around 2.5 km from Rasuwagadhi.

If the ICD is built in Timure, Nepal will get second well-equipped dry port to conduct commercial trade with northern neighbour via road. Currently, ICD in Larcha, near Tatopani, is the only dry port on Nepal-China border.

The proposed dry port at Timure, which will spread over around five hectares of land, will house a five-storey administrative complex, a parking lot which can fit in 350 trucks, a warehouse built on 750 sq m of land, two appraisal sheds spread on a total of 2,080 sq m of land, a check post and other necessary physical infrastructure.

The Ministry of Commerce and Supplies and the Chinese government had signed a Memorandum of Understanding on development of the ICD at Timure on October 16, 2014. The Ministry of Finance of Nepal and Chinese government had then exchanged letters for construction of the ICD on April 10, 2015.

But after that Nepal was struck by devastating earthquakes on April 25 and May 12 which also damaged the Rasuwagadhi (Nepal)-Kyirong (China) trade route and delayed the process of preparing designs of the project.

Then on November 15, 2015, China sent a technical team of ARDITAR to Nepal to conduct inspection of the site where the ICD is being built. The team has already submitted the preliminary design of the project.

China government will bear all the cost involved in the construction of the ICD, except the cost of purchasing the land. The Nepal government has provided 5.5 hectares of land for the construction of the ICD at Timure.

Because of the three-month Indian blockade at major entry points along the India-Nepal border and the coinciding Madhesi agitation over new constitution, thousands of Nepalis have become engaged in smuggling and peddling illegal petrol.

And the price for petrol has risen accordingly. The given rate for diesel, for example, is NRs 160, but the going rate is NRs 300-400, in some cases higher.

People are selling it on the streets in plastic soda bottles, from storefronts and sometimes from their rented rooms. Almost all small towns on the Nepal-India border have turned into fuel bazaars since many people on both sides have opted for the “fuel business”. Due to the embargo and the standoff on the border, many people have lost their stable jobs and have begun to smuggle fuel as an alternative to make money.

According to a spokesperson from Nepal Oil Corporation (NOC), the country is receiving around 30% of its requirements from India since the embargo started, all of which is going to security agencies, top government officials, hospitals and the diplomatic community. All other fuel is being fulfilled by black marketeers. They use illegal routes to transport fuel and gasoline through motorcycles, tractors, scooters, cars, cycles and other forms of transportation. Their job is made easier by the fact that security personnel deployed at the border areas are accepting bribes.

"I am buying fuel in black market near Pashupati Nath temple area where dozens of buses bring petrol from Tarai and sell them," Hari Tamang, a taxi driver told IANS. He has been buying a liter of petrol for NRs.350 for the last three months. And as a result, he is charging commuters three times the actual fare.

Nepal's Commission for Investigation of Abuse of Authority had warned the monitoring authorities to be vigilant or face action, but the situation has not improved. Some NOC officials have been found involved in the black marketing and even the managing director of NOC, Gopal Bahadur Khadka, is now under suspicion of hindering the October 28 MoU signed by China and India, wherein China would provide fuel to Nepal to compensate for the blockade.

There is growing suspicion that the deal may be collapsing because the NOC is apparently so buried in bureaucracy that it cannot make any progress. In the last two months of the crisis, only three meetings of the NOC board, chaired by commerce secretary, were held and they were focused on monitoring and distribution of petroleum products rather than on expediting the business-to-business (B2B) deal with PetroChina. Some are asking if the delay is intentional: Is Gopal Bahadur Khadka trying to ensure that his privately owned company, Birat Petroleum, somehow directly benefits from the MoU?

One thing is certain, there is no dearth of corruption in Nepal, whether along the streets and alleyways of impoverished communities, or down the rarified halls of parliament.

In response to an urgent request from the Ministry of Health and Population in Nepal to address a critical drug shortage caused by an ongoing border impasse, Direct Relief today sent an initial emergency airlift containing $3.5 million of specifically requested medications and supplies and is rallying additional support from healthcare company supporters to address the crisis.

The medications included in this initial shipment constitute 2.6 million “defined daily doses” — the World Health Organization-developed standard that reflects how much of a particular drug is needed for one day’s therapy. The shipment also contains other requested essential items, including IV solutions, needles and syringes, and various hospital and lab supplies.

Direct Relief is planning a follow-on airlift in two weeks and is working with its broad range of healthcare company supporters and partners to mobilize additional medications and supplies that have been urgently requested.

Since Nepal’s earthquakes in April and May, Direct Relief has delivered 144 tons of specifically requested medical essentials worth $28.98 million to health facilities throughout the country’s earthquake-affected regions and has provided an additional $1.7 million in cash grants to support local Nepalese health groups.

Nepal’s government had a November 21 deadline, it’s second, to vote in the Reconstruction Bill, which would finally free up relief funds donated by international organizations. The major political parties, in their interminable self-serving struggle for power, once again failed to reach a consensus by the deadline. They were granted one extra day to reach a consensus. But CPN-UML, UCPN (Maoist) and Nepali Congress (NC) failed, yet again, to reach a consensus. (It will be remembered that the initially blown deadline was August 1. See my interview with Dr. Govind Raj Pokharel, the then-appointed CEO of the National Reconstruction Authority (NRA), for more details concerning the August 1 travesty.)

Why the interminable delay, even though it means that nothing substantive has been done to address the woes of quake victims and to carry out the multi-billion dollars’ reconstruction and recovery work in disaster-hit areas?

The major parties are eyeing the post of the CEO of the National Reconstruction Authority, which will be responsible for mobilizing vast sums of money tagged for reconstruction projects. The NC has demanded that its earlier appointee Dr. Govind Pokhrel should be entrusted the job, particularly given his stellar resume and his diligence during the first few months after the quakes. Pokhrel was appointed CEO by the NC-led government, but his appointment was overturned by the new UML government. UML has said a person picked by NC should not hold the post since the authority is an entity of the government of which NC is not a part – a logic this writer fails to comprehend.

NC has also opposed the decision of revising the structure of the authority. A panel under the Bill Committee had proposed a three-tier structure of the authority, namely Directive Committee, Advisory Council, and Executive Committee.

Under the proposed structure, the UML prime minister would chair the Directive Committee and the Advisory Council while the authority’s CEO would lead the Executive Committee. A leader from the main opposition party has been proposed for the post of the vice-chairman of the Directive Committee and the Advisory Council.

For a more detailed backstory, see my recent article published in The Daily Beast:

Beginning last Sunday, the Nepali government began selling firewood to the public to augment the absence of cooking gas – just the latest sign that, with the onset of winter, India’s “unofficial blockade” at Nepal’s border has painted the country into very serious corner. Many life-saving medicines either have been used up or will be gone within weeks, perhaps less. Only 60% of private and boarding schools have reopened since the Diwali holidays and many of those are dubious as to how longer they can hold out. Ambulances have no fuel. Food prices continue to rise. Domestic air-flights have been reduced by half. 90% of factories have shut down, according the Rederation of Nepalese Chamber of Commerce and Industry. The Nepal Oil Company has announced that it cannot distribute any more fuel because it has run out of stock. And the earthquake survivors from the hardest hit districts – 400,000 people (80,000 families) remain in desperate need of shelter and food, more so each day as cold weather moves in.

Astoundingly, the standoff between the Indian and Nepali governments and the Madhesi groups (that are protesting ethnic-related clauses in the new constitution rushed into law) seems ever more intractable. It has been over 50 days since the 21 September blockade was created, with no signs of significant reconciliation between parties.

Nepal has focused on China as at least a partial solution. Petroleum products have come in from Nepal’s northern border. But until Chinese entry routes can be repaired, which were destroyed by the spring earthquakes, Beijing’s ability to assist is limited.

Suresh Acharya, a member of a high-level committee formed to draft the Common Policies and Programs of the present coalition government, wrote in yesterday’s The Himalayan Times:

It is also notable that the UN Inter-Agency Standing Committee’s Emergency Response Preparedness approach has been also rolled out in Nepal and it remains a priority country for emergency response preparedness. According to UN yardstick, Nepal is the fifth country in the world today with incidence of severe humanitarian crisis after Iraq, Central African Republic, South Sudan and Syria.

As far back as November 5, when a delegation of donor countries and aid agencies called on Prime Minister Oli, complaining that they had reached critical difficulties in providing assistance to earthquake survivors because of the fuel crisis, the alarm was sounded, to no avail. The delegation included heads of the EU, the British mission, the Japanese mission, the Asian Development Bank, USAID, among other aid agencies.

In the meantime, the Nepali government seems primarily interested in proving to the international community that the country’s problems are no one else’s business.

The following article, originally published as “Donors are ready to Build Schools” on November 6, was written by Maker Shrestha for Kantipur Daily in Nepali. It was translated into English by my assistant and edited by me.

Kathmandu – The I/NGOs are ready to commence the construction of the school buildings destroyed by the earthquakes, but the government has not yet provided them with the necessary school-building design. Forty-eight organizations have already signed a MOU with the Department of Education (DoE) to construct 2500 classrooms of 500 schools, investing about 2 billion Nepali Rupees. It’s been six months since the earthquakes but the department still does not have the design of the school buildings.

Nor has the department allocated any budget for the construction of schools devastated by the earthquakes. This is after the commitment received from the JAICA and ADB for school reconstruction. ADB has already sign an agreement with the department, but the JAICA has not. Students in these schools have no option but to study outside [or in temporary structures] because of the negligence of the department.

“The Chamber of Commerce and Industries has signed an agreement with the department to construct 140 schools but hasn’t been able to start the construction in absence of the design,” says Kishor Kumar Pradhan, the vice-president of the organization. It has agreed to spend 224 million Rupees for the project. “We have already visited the department more than 40 times asking for the design” and “every time the answer is ‘sure’”. This is the attitude that has frustrated the donors. Few donors have proposed to design the school buildings on their own and these designs have also not been given approval by the department.

The Small World Nepal has signed an agreement to build five schools in Solukhumbu but has not received the design to commence the construction. “We have been frequenting the department asking them to approve the design we developed. [If they don’t accept our design they should] provide us with their design,” says the chair of the organization, Karma Sherpa. He says, “in absence of a proper school building, the students are suffering in the village where we have committed to build. But the government delays the process.” Small World Nepal has provided the Department of Education with five million Rupees but the department insists on more funds. “Donors wants to know ‘what kind of schools are we supposed to be building?’ How much will it cost?” says Karma.

[This has put the brakes on] not only organizations but also individuals, who have collected donations for school reconstruction. Sudeep Ghimire and his friends want to construct two schools in Rasuwa from the surplus funds they received for early rescue and recovery. They already made an agreement with the department to construct one school. Ghimire says that they already have five million Rupees allocated for the school but that they are waiting for the DoE design before they can start construction “Whenever we ask for the design, the department asks us to come the next day or the next week. They keep postponing the date”. One donor said, “The longer the department keeps the donor waiting, the more proposed school projects will disappear. The donors are now in the mood to scrap their projects.”

Many organizations have signed agreements with the DoE to build schools, including Radha Swami Satsang for 18 schools, Choudahry Foundation for 100 schools, Children Reach Nepal for 18 schools, Helvetas for 20 schools in Sindhupalchok, Helambu Education and Livelihood for 15 schools. and Room to Read for 43 schools. There are other organizations that are ready to build at least one school in these districts.

The civil engineer of the department, Yubraj Poudel says that the DoE has completed one design for primary schools, but still working for alternative primary school designs and new designs for lower secondary and secondary school. He further said that it will take at least a month to finish other designs. “Those who have submitted their design to the department need not wait long now, since, the meeting of the technical committee is scheduled for Friday and the meeting will approve the appropriate designs,” says Engineer Poudel.

More than six months after the earthquake that devastated Nepal, the government has yet to begin disbursing $4.1 billion in aid, and cold is settling in.

KATHMANDU, Nepal—I was here in Kathmandu when the earthquake hit on April 25, 2015, just over six months ago, and I witnessed the instantaneous resilience of the local population – the civic engagement of people from all walks of life – young and old, rich and poor, rolling up their sleeves in a united effort to remove rubble from trapped victims. There were no political motives that day. In the devastated streets of the capital, there were only nameless Nepalis trying to relieve the suffering of fellow nameless Nepalis.

In spite of the horror, I was proud to experience humanity in its finest hour. But the story since has not been so edifying. In fact, it’s been shameful

Last April, the moment the news of the earthquake broke, governments, institutions and individuals from all over the world rushed to Nepal’s assistance, either through direct relief efforts or donations. In the end, the international community – both public and private – pledged over $4.1 billion dollars to implement relief and reconstruction here.

Every penny was needed: Nepal is one of the poorest countries in the world. And in addition to the 7.6 magnitude earthquake in April, a second 7.3 quake struck Nepal on May 12. The combined devastation resulted in almost 9,000 deaths, with many more thousands injured, and a third of Nepal’s population – approximately eight million people – having their lives disrupted in one serious way or another. An estimated 850,000 homes were either destroyed or badly damaged. In some districts, over 90 percent of the buildings were flattened.

In the immediate aftermath, the Nepal Army’s response to the crisis was particularly outstanding, eclipsing the civilian government’s efforts to provide leadership. Other nations’ militaries joined forces under the supervision of the Nepal Army’s disaster relief operation “Sankat Mochan.” The Indian Army played the most significant international role. The United Nations and other major non-governmental organizations dove in, helping to pick up the slack left by a seemingly directionless political administration.

In June, finally, the government proposed a bill that would establish the National Reconstruction Authority (NRA), a body slated to handle the disbursement of the $4.1 billon that had poured in from international well wishers.

And then nothing happened.

As unbelievable as this may sound, as of today, the NRA is still not operational and the $4.1 billion have not been distributed.

When this became apparent, donors expressed outrage and the government, by way of excusing itself, explained that there had been a “parliamentary oversight”: There was a time limitation to vote on the bill and the government had simply forgotten to enact it, thus inadvertently allowing the NRA deadline to lapse.

Analysts beg to differ. The reason the National Reconstruction Authority was “forgotten” was because the leaders of the Constituent Assembly, widely referred to as the CA, had put their priorities elsewhere. Come hell or high water or earthquakes they meant to stay focused on the CA’s primary responsibility, the completion of the new constitution.

There was an irony here: For nearly eight years, the CA had dragged its feet and allowed itself to be distracted by inter-political haggling, thus failing to draft a new charter. But by early 2015, the completion of the constitution was put on the fast track and the politicians suddenly became hell-bent on getting the draft approved. With that accomplished, a new government could immediately be formed and then it could be established what to do about earthquake relief and – not so incidentally – which party would hold the reins of NRA disbursement.

Last month, I interviewed the originally designated CEO of the National Reconstruction Authority, Govinda Raj Pokharel. His frustration was evident. Members of Parliament “cannot always accuse the government, because they are also responsible. That – blaming someone else – is our biggest challenge and that will bring chaos,” sad Pokharel. “All these broken societies – many single women, orphans and many others – many unwanted social activities can happen, which can destabilize our rural system. People will migrate and there will be less production in rural areas. That will be the negative side of not managing reconstruction activities well.”

As of today, Pokharel remains in limbo about the status of his job. In the second week of October, the old Nepali Congress Party’s leadership was scuttled and a new government was installed, headed by a new prime minister, KP Sharma Oli. Oli is the chairman of the Communist Party of Nepal (United Marxist Leninist) and it seems likely that someone from his party will replace Pokharel. In Nepali politics, continuity always plays second fiddle to shoring up a party’s power base.

The point is this: Because of the Constituent Asslembly’s preoccupation with completing the constitution writing, the earthquake disaster was kept on the backburner. Reconstruction funds were frozen from the get-go and, even worse, remain frozen today.

People who lost their homes have received little aid beyond an initial $150 per-household government payout. They were promised $2,000, but until the legitimate status of the NRA is established, no additional funds can go out.

Likewise, because of the NRA fiasco, building codes for new construction have been slow to be published, creating mounting frustration for those – including NGOs – who would like to get started on new construction before winter sets in. In the absence of clear guidelines, no one really knows what the government’s support for reconstruction will look like. To give but one example, last month a major Indian NGO abandoned its plans to build 100 health posts because the Nepal government insisted on “lavish” demands including marble floors and granite work surfaces. Someone in the bureaucracy was trying to get rich on the down low.

Why would the Nepal government sideline earthquake relief efforts in favor of promulgating a new constitution? The answer requires some historical backtracking.

At the end of the 10-year conflict with the Maoists, the 2006 Comprehensive Peace Agreement was signed, which highlighted social reform, giving a big nod to minority groups – particularly the Madhesi and Tharus in the south, who constitute approximately 40 percent of Nepal’s population. In 2008, the provisional government endorsed an eight-point agreement with ethnic minorities, accepting their demands for increased representation through a federal structure with autonomous regions – although no one pretended to know how these federal states might look on a map.

Then, after the historical 2008 elections in which the Maoists prevailed, the CA declared Nepal to be a federal democratic republic. The monarchy was abolished. A new charter was to be drafted and promulgated within two years. That was the mandate. During those two years, the CA would come to an agreement as to how “federalism” in Nepal would be defined.

It didn’t happen.

As Minister of Commerce and Supplies Sunil Bahadur Thapa explained to me in my recent interview with him that the CA drifted away from a true democratic process almost immediately:

“It went wrong after the 2008 elections,” he said. “Of course the Maoists were in total command of the CA. No doubt about it. But I’m speaking about all the major political parties. The party leaders did not take their own MPs or CA members into their confidence, when beginning the writing of a new constitution. All the decision-making took place outside the CA building. The formulation of a new constitution took place in private homes. If I remember correctly, there were only 16 to 20 people who were really involved in writing the constitution – this out of 601 CA members. Of these 16 to 20 people, only 10 were elected members of the CA. The rest of the “writers” were people who were defeated in the elections. That was one of the major mistakes that the political parties made. To make matters worse, the issues that people in the south had fought for were never introduced in the CA for discussion.”

Fast-forward to 2015. The earthquakes put Nepal under the international klieg lights. In a sense, the country had two runaway trains to deal with. One was created by Mother Nature. The other was man-made, spearheaded by the leaders of the three main political parties, carving the country into federal states.

The international community (except for China, which kept mum) cautioned the leaders to slow down a little, to take more time and rethink the manner in which they were delineating the boundaries of the federal states – particularly around the traditionally marginalized communities in the south.

Nepal’s leading politicians cried “foul” and warned the international community – particularly India, which has long (and deservedly) had the reputation of being Nepal’s overbearing neighbor – to stay out of Nepal’s internal affairs. The party leaders, successfully playing the nationalist card, raised their heads high and frog-marched the charter to its September 20th promulgation.

Then came a predictable, and predicted, response. The southern minority groups felt betrayed and struck back at the Kathmandu-centric power structure. They blockaded the Indian border crossings, which prevented essential items –petroleum products being the most important – from entering the landlocked nation of Nepal.

India poured salt on the wound by instructing its Border Security Force to hold up trucks attempting to make their way into Nepal. The Indian blockade was and is not an “official” one, according to India. New Delhi claims it is only concerned about the safety of trucks coming into Nepal from its side of the border.

The vast majority of Nepalis find India’s explanation ludicrous and insulting as Nepalis who lost everything during the earthquakes – continue silently subsisting in makeshift dwellings.

Summer is the monsoon season in Nepal. This year, heavy downpours washed away crucial roads, which, in turn, eliminated rescue operations from reaching remote and even not-so-remote areas hardest hit by the earthquakes that hit in the late spring. There was no question of being able to construct new buildings during the monsoon. The most one could do was to distribute tarps and corrugated metal roofing to fend off the rains until September.

But just when the skies began to clear, the blockades were imposed, thereby eliminating the ability of vehicles to deliver fuel, supplies and construction materials to the devastated areas. As a result, the odds of helping earthquake victims before the onset of winter grow worse by the day. Without fuel, over 80,000 families in dire need of durable shelter and numerous relief items have been stranded and left wondering how they will survive the impending cold weather.

Fuel scarcity has spread to all sectors. The government has imposed strict limitations on the amount of petrol Nepalis can buy at any one time. The waiting lines stretch back kilometers. The price of fuel has skyrocketed and the black market is thriving. Some people have reported buying petrol ten times the regular price. Likewise, cooking gas is all but unavailable, prompting even well heeled families to resort to wood-burning stoves. As a result, in some areas, protected forests are being cut for firewood.

Food prices have become wildly inflated, in some cases as much as 100 percent. Medical supplies are running out at the hospitals. Ambulances can no longer operate. Schools have been shut. Businesses have closed their doors. Internet services, which require generators during load-sharing hours, are threatening to halt services. Construction materials have soared in price.

Tourism, which accounts for a significant percentage of Nepal’s GDP, has all but evaporated; Chinese Eastern Airlines cancelled all flights to Nepal, citing the unavailability of aviation fuel at the Kathmandu airport, and Chinese tourists have evanesced. The economy is bleeding in every direction. It is Nepal’s number one preoccupation.

Even if the blockades were lifted tomorrow and fuel became easily available, even if the government reinstated the NRA overnight – two very unlikely scenarios – many experts say it is already too late to “winterize” the most remote areas in Nepal. The window before winter arrives in Nepal has now narrowed down to one or two more weeks at most.

According to a statement issued last month by the U.N. Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator for Nepal, “It is of critical importance to deliver supplies to the trailheads by the end of October, as the passes in the Himalayas will be at increased risk of being blocked by snowfall." That clock is still ticking.

A backlog of 1,200 metric tons of shelter and non-food items is already stuck in storage warehouses, unable to reach targeted earthquake communities – first because of the monsoons and now because of the scarcity of fuel. The recent monsoons limited road and air delivery to remote regions. With winter arriving within the next fortnight, it will be a race to get even these pre-arranged relief packages delivered to the intended villages before the first big snow storm.

The devastated communities know only too well that time is running out for them. They survived the monsoon, but sub-zero temperatures and snow-blocked mountain passes will be far more challenging – particularly for the elderly, children and pregnant women. Cold-related illnesses are inevitable. People are going to freeze to death in Nepal this winter. The question is: how many? Communication options are so limited that we may not really know until spring.

Meanwhile, southern unrest continues, and politicians – inside and outside the nation’s borders – scramble to secure short-term victories, the victims of the earthquakes stare at their watches and check the temperature outside.

Another nine left for China yesterday and were expected to return with fuel later in the day.

Spokesperson for NOC Deepak Baral told reporters in Rasuwa that, of 1,000 metric tons of petrol granted by China, Nepal will collect the remaining fuel within a week.

Although the tankers have the capacity to carry 12,000 litres of gasoline each, they were only filled with 9,000 litres because of road conditions in the mountainous terrain, he added.

China is giving Nepal 1.3 million litres of gasoline to help it deal with a severe fuel crisis caused by an Indian blockade.

Nepal also entered into an unprecedented agreement with China last week for the commercial import of a third of Nepal's fuel demand, ending more than four decades of supply monopoly by India, after supplies from the country did not improve despite repeated diplomatic efforts.

"The Nepalese government plans to purchase one third of its total demand for petroleum products from China in the coming days," Mahesh Maskey, the country's ambassador to China, told Xinhua Saturday evening."We will soon finalize the technical modalities," he said.

Despite sporadic instances of some fuel trickling into Nepal, India has effectively blockaded the Himalayan nation since September 20 leading to crippling shortages of gasoline, diesel, cooking gas, and aviation fuel.

The blockade started when Nepal adopted a new constitution, ignoring India's wishes that the adoption be postponed to address the demands of protesting Madhesi people who have cultural, linguistic and social ties with India.

India denies it has blockaded Nepal and has blamed anti-constitution protests by Madhesis for the obstruction.

a bridge preventing trucks from moving in, to other crossings, where traffic is flowing more smoothly. Still, only a third of the regular supply has been reinstated, Indian and Nepalese officials say.

Nanda Bahadur Pun, (better known during the 10-year civil war as “Comrade Pasang”), was elected today as Nepal’s new Vice President.

He is 50 years old and a member of the Central Committee of the Maoists’ party UCPN.

Until today, Pun has never held public office, despite his party being in power twice in the last seven years. He has a secondary education.

Pun was born on 23 October 1965 in Bhanbhane, Rangsi VDC-9 of Rolpa. He is the son of Ramsur and Manasara Pun, the fourth among seven children.

In 1981, while still a teenager, Pun became involved with radical student politics. He joined the All Nepal National Free Students Union (ANNFSU) “Sixth”. The ANNFSU, founded in 1965, is a politically based student organization, associated with the pro-China trend of the Nepalese communist movement.

During the 1980s, Pun became a district committee member of the Communist Party of Nepal (Unity Center). In 1990, he became the first district president of the newly formed Young Communist League (YCL). This was an armed front of the Unity Center formed to aggressively counter activities of the then ruling Nepali Congress party, which was filing cases against Pun’s party.

When the party divided in 1994, Pun sided with the wing that would become the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist). The YCL – at that time known as Ladak u Dal (Fighting Force) was then converted into a militia.

The Ladak u Dal took part in the launching of the “People's War” with the night attack of a police post in Holeri on 13 February 1996. Pun was there, acting as an assistant commander under Barsha Man Pun, aka “Ananta”.

Nanda Bahadur Pun’s rise through the Maoist military ranks was steady and rapid.

In 2001, when Ladak u Dal became the “People’s Liberation Army” (PLA), Pun was made commander of the first battalion. He takes credit for having been involved with most of the PLA’s major attacks in Western Nepal against security forces – a decade-long conflict that resulted in the deaths of more than 16,000 Nepalis.

Pun was named chief commander of PLA in 2008, two years after the Comprehensive Peace Accord (CPA) was signed.

As part of the peace agreement, the ex-guerrillas were sequestered in cantonments scattered across Nepal – at least in theory – until the soldiers’ re-integration into society could be established.

Maoist leadership demanded that their high-ranking commandos be given officer status in the Nepal Army (NA).

The NA rejected this out-of-hand because their officers training and education met the highest international standards, while the guerillas had received virtually no professional training during their 10 years of underground fighting. The Maoists pressed back, insisting that Pun be given the rank of general in the NA, to no avail. The NA’s insistence on maintaining internationally-accepted army standards prevailed.

In the end, Pun took voluntary “retirement” and turned his attention to the political arena.

In November 2013, national Constituent Assembly elections were held in Nepal. Pun ran for a slot as a UCPN-Maoist party candidate in the Kathmandu-4 sector. Pun lost to the young and very popular Nepali Congress party leader Gagan Thapa.

Interestingly, shortly before the election, Pun posted a 23-minute self-promotional video on youtube entitled Who is Nanda Kishor Pun ‘Pasang’?

Pun has sought to be taken seriously as a political force ever since. He doesn’t shy away from self-promotion. In 2014 alone he posted 10 videos of himself on youtube.

In Nepal, the Vice-Presidency is vested with little real responsibility other than functioning as Head of State in the absence of the President. Likewise, the President’s role is primarily ceremonial, most often being described as the “protector of the Constitution.”

It is the Prime Minister who wields the real power in Nepal’s government.

Health-wise, it should be noted that Vice-President Pun has suffered failure of both of his kidneys. Up until now, he has declined going abroad for treatment, preferring to get medical help within the boundaries of Nepal.

The election results showed that Pun had beat out his Nepali Congress opponent, Amiya Kumar Yadav 325 to 212, a solid margin of 113 votes. Lawmakers from Madhesi parties protesting against the new constitution abstained from voting.